Rice price sharply declining in city market

Prices of most rice varieties have been declining sharply in the city markets for the last two weeks while the decline in staple food prices is likely to continue for further periods.

The price of medium and coarse variety rice has been declined and the situation is expected to continue for at least the next two months as the ongoing Boro harvest is likely to continued till the middle of the next month.

Visiting the capital city's Karwan Bazaar and Mohammadpur Krishi Market, the BSS found that the prices of all sorts of medium and coarse variety rice have declined up to Tk3 per kilogram, compared to last week.

At present, medium fine-quality Miniket rice is being sold at Tk66 per kg, while it was sold at Tk68 last week.

At the wholesale market, the price of a 50-kg sack of Miniket rice now stands at Tk3,215, a drop of Tk287 from the earlier Tk3,500, said Morshed Alam, a wholesaler of Mohammadpur Govt Krishi market.

"The rice price is declining by Tk100-150 per 50-kg sack on average. The price fall situation is likely to continue for another one and half months", said the wholeseller.

Even the coarse variety 'BR-28' is being sold at Tk52 per kg, which was Tk55 earlier. The selling price of a 50-kg sack of the rice variety now stands at Tk2,500, down from Tk2,730-2,750, a week ago.

Talking about the present rice price situation, noted farm economist Dr Jahangir Alam said, "There is no chance of rice price hike in the next two months as the overall yield of Aman and Boro has crossed the optimum level."

Alam, however, said the rice price is likely to decline more in the coming days as the Boro rice accounts for 54% of the total rice output.

The rice price is getting lower as the new harvest floods the market with growers usually selling 60% of their total harvest during this season, the economist added.

"The lower price situation will not continue for a long period as the Boro yield was not up to the mark due to prolonged drought in most parts of the country except in haor areas", said Nirod Baran Saha, general secretary of Rice Arotdar Samity.

The Arotdar Samity leader said the Boro production has been hampered by 3 to 5 maund per bigha in different areas except the haor region as the haor area contributes only 13% of the boro output.

However, Badal Chandra Biswas, director general (DG) of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) said "We are expecting optimum Boro production this year against the production target of 2.22 crore tonnes set for FY24 as the result of overall yield was standard and there is no weakness".

Data released by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) on the production of dry season crop Boro showed that the country bagged 2.07 crore tonnes of the staple grain during the Boro season in FY23, up 3% from the previous fiscal year.

Total rice production grew 2.5% year-on-year to 3.91 crore tonnes, the highest on record, in FY23.