The Philippines will import 0.1 million tonnes of rice from Bangladesh, the Ministry of Agriculture said on Monday.
The decision came at a meeting between agriculture minister Muhammad Abdur Razzaque and the rice exporters at his secretariat office, the ministry said in a statement.
Belgium National Company representative Marc Coll from HLWC Philippine led the delegation of Filipino exporters.
While the Southeast Asian nation is a rice-exporting country, it re-exports the food grain after importing it from different countries.
Marc Coll said they will import more rice gradually from Bangladesh as the country's rice is of good quality and cheaper.
Mr Coll also said Filipino people like parboiled rice of Bangladesh.
The agriculture minister said Bangladesh runs a surplus of 1.0 million tonnes of rice a year.
He said the country will export more rice in future.
"We have better quality and cheaper rice compared with other rice-exporting countries," the minister said.
Bangladesh has the potential to export rice, he added.
Samsul A. Syed, CEO of the HLWC Bangladesh; Md. Rashid, managing director of the Rashid Group and Md. Zahirul Huq, executive director of the Rashid Group were, among others, present at the meeting.
