The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

Prices of almost all kinds of rice have increased by Tk 2 to Tk 3 per kilogram as both the wholesale and retail markets have now become dependent on rumour and speculation instead of facts.

Depending on the speculation that rice prices may go up soon, producers, wholesalers and retailers have been raising the prices of both coarse and fine varieties of rice everyday.

As the rice prices have been showing upward trend, a sense of panic has now gripped the country's people though the government has ruled out any possibility of rice price spiraling in the context of bumper boro harvest.

After India re-fixed the export prices of rice at $1,000 (Tk 70,000) per metric tonne (1metric tonne= 1000 kilograms) last week, a sort of unusual trend in rice prices has been prevailing in both wholesale and retail markets. In the city's retail markets all kinds of coarse and fine rice were increased by Tk 2 to Tk 3 a kg yesterday. As the fair price shops operated by the Bangladesh Rifles remained closed yesterday because of their weekly holiday, customers thronged the retail markets yesterday to buy rice.

On the other hand, the government has planned to build up a food stock of 10 lakh metric tones by July next. The plan has been taken to cope with any kind of abnormal situation over the price of rice in the country. The government expects that it will be able to build up this stock of rice by importing five lakh tones of rice from India and procuring paddy and rice from farmers after the harvest of boro paddy in the next month.

Informing about the government's plan to build up a stock of 10 lakh metric tonens of rice, Molla Wahiduzzaman, acting food and disaster management secretary, said the boro harvest would begin with the import of four lakh tones of Indian rice which was endorsed by the Advisory Committee on Public Purchase on Sunday. In spite of it, rice from India is mainly being imported to build up a stock taking the country's food security into account.

Besides, procuring rice from the local sources the government wants to build up a stock of 10-12 lakh tones of rice.

He said the government floated tenders for 36 times to procure food last year, but could not be able to build up a stock of more than 4.5 lakh tonnes of rice. "In order to avert such a situation in the next fiscal year, the government has decided to build up a stock of 10-12 lakh tonnes of rice as a precautionary measure,' he said.

According to the statistics available with the Directorate of Food, the boro cultivation in the country has crossed the target this year. Breaking all the previous records, boro crops have been cultivated in 49.35 lakh hectares of agricultural land this year. Unless there is no natural calamities, the country may witness a bumper production of boro crop this year.

During the current fiscal year the government has fixed the target of 1.75 crore (17.5 million) metric tonnes of boro rice production this year. Initiatlly the target was 1.64 crore (16.4 million) metric tonnes.

This include hybrid rice 57.50 lakh metric tones, high-yielding variety (HYV) 1.16 lakh metric tones and local varieties 2.20 lakh metric tones. If there is a bumper production of boro crops the government will be able to procure rice from there to build its food stock. Moreover the government will have the scope to build up stock procuring Irri rice from some parts of the country. But the situation may change at any moment if any major natural disaster hits the country once again. That is why the government has planned to build up a stock a food from earlier.