Staff Reporter :
Scientists and experts at a discussion on Saturday alleged that the mill owners are cheating with the countrymen by making rice attractive and urged to stop such deceptive activities by enacting law immediately.
They came up with the comments while speaking at a roundtable titled “Market Expansion and Popularisation of Zinc Enriched Biofortified Rice” organised by Banikbarta at its conference room in the city.
Speaking at the roundtable as chief guest, Dr Shamsul Alam, State Minister for Planning, said, “The millers grind the rice by polishing it. As a result, many nutrients have lost from the rice.”
“Besides, the millers are establishing rice brand as per their own choices whichever the rice variety. Such deceptive activity is unacceptable in a thriving economy. It should be stopped by enacting law,” the minister said.
“The government is implementing big plans to prevent malnutrition. Zinc cannot be supplied only through rice. However, as rice is the staple food of the people of the country, it is easy to supply Zinc through it,” he said.
“Iodine in salt and vitamins in oil have been made mandatory by law. So, the law should be enacted to ensure Zinc in rice,” the minister said.
Md Nasiruzzaman, former secretary of the Agriculture Ministry and Chairman of Krishi Bank, said,
“Several countries, including Bhutan, want to import Zinc-enriched rice from Bangladesh. But we can’t afford it due to the deceive activities.”
“Besides, it takes 15-16 years to popularise the rice variety after its invention, it should be reduced. If a farmer wants to cultivate nutritious paddy, the farmer will get loan without collateral,” the Krishi bank chairman said.
Md Shahjahan Kabir, Director General of Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI), said, “All the rice varieties have more or less Zinc. However, if it is possible to popularise the two varieties of rice (BRRI-74 and 84), it will be possible to fill the gap of Zinc of the people.”
“For this, we have to move forward with an action plan and integrated plan,” he added.
Rice is husked up to 30 per cent in order to give it a look of the fine varieties of the misnomer like “miniket,” “nazir shail” and “katari” etc.
Anwar Faruqe, former secretary of the Agriculture Ministry, Dr Nazma Shahin, Professor of the Institute of Nutrition and Food Science of Dhaka University and Dr Khairul Bashar, Country Manager of the Harvest Plus, among others, spoke at the event.
