The government is preparing to buy more food grains from the global market to cope with a possible fall in rice output in this Aman season, Food Minister Shadhan Chandra Majumder said at a press briefing on Monday.
The ministry organised the briefing to inform the newsmen about the Boro procurement, Aman production, and rice import and supply scenario.
"In addition to importing rice from Vietnam and India, the government is now continuing negotiations with many other countries to buy more rice," Mr Majumder said.
The government is taking advance preparations following concerns of lower rice production in the ongoing Aman season amid drought and other problems.
He noted that the government has been able to buy more rice than its target through domestic procurement, but paddy collection suffered amid high rates.
The target for parboiled rice procurement was 1.1 million tonnes, while the collection was 1.121 million tonnes. The target for white rice (atap) procurement was 50,000 tonnes, while the collection was 55,208 tonnes.
The government managed to purchase 0.268 million tonnes of paddy against the target of 0.65 million tonnes.
The minister also said the public sector food stock is now above 2.0 million tonnes. The government would buy more food grains, as it would continue the subsidised sales or open market sale (OMS) programme.
tonmoy.wardad@gmail.com