Staff Reporter :
The Directorate General of Food has floated an international tender to procure 50,000 MT of non-Basmati parboiled rice in an effort to replenish reserves.
It posted the tender notice on its website on Monday, in its first buying attempt of the grain in three year.
The deadline to submit offers is November 26, with validity up to December 10. The rice is to be shipped within 40 days of signing a contract, according to the tender document.
Bangladesh, the world’s fourth-biggest rice producer, has emerged as an importer of the grain this year after floods domestic output.
“The government plans to import rice amid a potential shortfall in output after floods destroyed crop,” a senior food ministry official said.
Prices of rice have gone up around 50 per cent since March amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Market insiders, however, said the government’s move to import rice might have a positive impact on the market prices of the grain.
In 2019, the government raised the rice import duty to 55 per cent from 28 per cent to support farmers amid a dramatic fall in prices.
“There is no plan to cut import duty at this time. We need to protect our farmers,” Agriculture Minister Abdur Razzak told media, adding the government would increase imports if required.
The country’s food reserve dropped to 8.8 lakh MT on Sunday, despite bumper grain production in the last fiscal year.
Officials said the food reserve came down after the Food Ministry missed the boro procurement target, bulk distribution of rice among the people affected by the coronavirus pandemic and floods.
Rice and wheat production stood at 3.76 crore MT in the fiscal year ending in June, 0.45 percent higher than the 3.74 crore MT year-on-year, according to the final estimate of the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS).
