THE government plan to allow private sector to export coarse variety of rice seems to be a good option. This is because the country is producing more than the local demand forcing farmers to sell at prices below their cost of production. Media reports on Wednesday said farmers cultivated less land this year to avoid loss. The government procurement scheme is not enough. This is because more procurement causes government stock to swallow without local demand while insufficient procurement causes farmers to suffer from market glut at lower price. Moreover the government mainly procures rice from millers without directly buying from farmers thus denying benefits of price support to farmers. In this background, there is no doubt; rice export may be a good option as the Commerce Minister indicated to handle the surplus. Data shows in 2014-15 the country produced 3.47 crore tonnes of rice against an annual demand of 3.28 crore tonnes leaving a surplus of 18.61 lakh tonnes. The government also allowed unnecessary import of over 10.84 lakh tonnes from India. It is not clear why we allow import of rice on the plea it is low cost but so far overlooked its dumping effect on local market and farmers income which forced farmers to sell their produce at lower than the production cost by Tk 2 to 5 per kg depending on seasonal variation. As per the Minister’s estimate, the country will have 30 to 40 lakh tonnes of surplus rice this year and it is time to make proper plan to handle the stock. In fact Bangladesh exported fifty thousand tonnes of rice to Sri Lanka in 2014-15 and the Minister is right to look for export market in African countries where India is already making huge export to clear its domestic stock. Many wonder that rice export may push its price up to the disadvantage of consumers but here the government must be able to put in place a balanced policy that would deny hoarders and retailers to artificially rising price while farmers would get its benefit in domestic market. The agricultural economics is a highly sensitive issue that demands supportive policies and its sensible application. Needless to say farmers have already reduced land under Boro farming this year to 46.60 lakh hectares compared to 48.40 lakhs hectares last year. They have switched land to producing wheat, maize, potato and such other cash crops; which fetch them better price. The government will procure 6 lakh tonnes of rice and 7 lakh tonnes of paddy from the farmers in this Boro season; which is not enough to handle the huge surplus. Exporting of rice may be a good option to earn foreign currency and give fair price to farmers. But we hear complaints that the rice cultivators are not getting fair price for their gain. Please do not cheat the poor hard working cultivators. Specially, when cheating is going on every where else.
