Import of 8.30 lakh tonnes of rice, wheat approved

The Cabinet Committee on Public Purchase on Wednesday approved imports of 3.30 lakh tonnes of rice from Vietnam and India, and 5 lakh tonnes of wheat from Russia to replenish food reserves and cool domestic prices, said a top official.

"Some 2.30 lakh tonnes of rice from Vietnam and 1 lakh tonnes from India will be imported under a G2G [government-to-government] arrangement," said Md Abdul Barik, additional secretary to the Cabinet Division, after the Cabinet committee meeting presided over by Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal.

Soaring prices of food staple rice for the country's 16.50 crore people pose a problem for the government, which plans to expand cut-price rice sales to help people hard-hit by high costs.

Of the food staple to be imported from neighbouring India, Abdul Barik said 70,000 tonnes of non-basmati parboiled rice will be brought in by sea at Tk42.13 per kg. Besides, 30,000 tonnes of rice will be imported by road at Tk40.70 per kg. In both cases, the import price will be $443.50 per tonne.

The committee approved import of 2 lakh tonnes of Thai non-basmati parboiled rice from Vietnam at $521 per tonne. The local market price will be Tk49.49 per kg.

Import of 30,000 tonnes of sun-dried white rice from Vietnam was also approved at $494 per tonne, or Tk46.93 per kg at the local market.

The committee approved import 5 lakh tonnes of wheat from Russia on G2G basis as the import payment will be in the US dollar. The per kg import price of the wheat will be Tk40.85.

Md Abdul Barik said wheat import rate will be $430 per tonne as a Russian firm will supply this food grain. The total cost of importing 5 lakh tonnes of wheat will be Tk2,042.50 crore.

He said the grains will start entering Bangladesh in phases from September.

Apart from this, the government has finalised the import of 2 lakh tonnes of rice from Myanmar. Dhaka and Naypyidaw have already reached an agreement in this regard. According to sources at the food ministry, Bangladesh and Myanmar will soon sign an agreement for rice import.

The country's wheat import came to a grinding halt following the Russia-Ukraine war in the third week of February. The conflict had left the country's overall wheat import to 40 lakh tonnes against the demand of about 65 lakh tonnes in the last fiscal year.

Boro harvest in the March-April period was marred by flooding as low rainfall during recent Aman paddy plantation clouds the overall rice supply – forcing the government to race for replenishing food stocks.

Apart from the government import, private importers were approved to bring in 10.10 lakh tonnes of rice at reduced import duty.

In an effort to rein in surging domestic prices, the government is going to sell rice at a cheaper rate for 50 lakh families from 1 September. At the same time, the food directorate is ramping up its open market rice sales across the country.

Currently, the government has a record 17.92 lakh tonnes of rice and 1.41 lakh tonnes of wheat in stock. Still, the authorities are taking measures to boost the food stock further.