The government will buy 16 lakh 50 thousand tonnes of paddy and rice from the domestic market in the coming boro season. The targets are four lakh tonnes of paddy and 12 lakh 50 thousand tonnes of parboiled rice.

The procurement price has been set at Tk 30 a kg for boro paddy and Tk 44 a kg for parboiled rice.

The decision was taken at a meeting of the Food Planning and Monitoring Committee at the Secretariat on Thursday (13 April), chaired by Food Minister Sadhan Chandra Majumder, who briefed journalists afterwards.

The food minister said procurement of boro paddy and rice will begin on 7 May and continue until 31 August. The procurement price of wheat has been set at Tk 35, with a target of one lakh tonnes.

Last boro season the targets were six and a half lakh tonnes of paddy and 13 lakh 61 thousand tonnes of rice. Against these, from 28 April to 31 August last year the government procured 2 lakh 68 thousand 248 tonnes of paddy and about 13 lakh 51 thousand tonnes of rice. Paddy was bought at Tk 27 and rice at Tk 40.

"This time the cost of producing paddy is Tk 28 to 29. We believe we have been able to set the right price for buying paddy and rice. We hope we can meet the procurement target," the food minister said.

Food Secretary Md Ismail Hossain said 17 lakh 30 thousand tonnes of food grain are now in government warehouses.

Agriculture Minister Md Abdur Razzaque said: "The paddy price has been raised compared with last year. The market price is already a little high, and our increase is in line with it. Last year the market price was high and ours was lower, so we could not procure paddy."

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.