Anisul Islam Noor :
The government will go for import of six lakh tonnes of rice in an effort to replenish reserves and rein in the prices of the staple food.
Waiving duties on its imports though strongly opposed by experts and the Ministry of Agriculture, is also under active consideration.
According to experts, the growers will be affected by the initiative as production cost is raised due to higher prices of labour, fertilizer, pesticide, irrigation and transportation.
However Food Minister Advocate Qamrul Islam MP said, “We decided to import rice for increasing our reserve level and tackling any crisis situation. We also plan waiving the import duty.” Agriculture Secretary Muhammad Moinuddin Abdullah said, ” We can make up the loss of rice production in haor areas as rice production areas are increased due to a good rainfall this year.”
The overall rice production in the country will be 10-12 lakh tonnes lesser this time due to haor crop damage.
Research Fellow of the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies (BIDS) M. Asaduzzaman said higher rice price is a good news for the farmers, they will work to increase more rice production.
“In the last few years our farmers had been affected mostly by the fall in rice production here. If the situation continues, the consumers might be affected,” he said.
However, Agriculture Statistics Division data show that annual rice demand is around 2.64 crore tonnes while the annual production is around 3.33 crore tonnes. That means 69 lakh tonnes of rice is surplus.
On the other hand, the Ministry of Agriculture claimed that the country is not only producing sufficient food but also rice is being exported. The government came up with the decision as the state reserve of foodgrains is a six- year low and local prices have hit a record high, said Badrul Hasan, Director General of Food.
“We will import 600,000 tonnes of rice, while we have already issued a tender and another tender will be issued very soon,” the DG Food added. He said the imports of rice through government-to-government deals with Thailand, Vietnam and India are also planned.
The world’s fourth-biggest producer of rice with more than 30 million tonnes of rice, Bangladesh consumes almost all its production.
It often requires imports to cope with the shortages caused by natural disasters such as floods and droughts.
Bangladesh was ranked as the fourth-largest importer of the grain by the US Department of Agriculture in 2011, as low stocks and soaring prices led the government to import.
Since then, the state grains buyer has not imported rice although private traders have done, mostly from India.
In 2015, Bangladesh’s government imposed a tariff of 28 percent on rice imports to protect local farmers after private traders imported around 1.5 million tonnes of rice from India, leading to a drop in prices in domestic markets.
Rice is the main staple for Bangladesh’s 160 million people, but wheat consumption is also rising due to lifestyle changes.
Bangladesh imports about 4.5 million tonnes of wheat annually to meet its growing demand, making it South Asia’s top wheat buyer, while the country’s output has stagnated at about 1 million tonnes.
