Govt moves to buy rice from Cambodia

As two successive attempts to import rice from Thailand and India have apparently fallen through for high prices, the government is now seeking to buy the staple from Cambodia.

A five-member delegation, led by Food Minister Qamrul Islam, is going to the country on Tuesday for striking a deal in this regard.

Recently, official teams from the two countries visited the capital for negotiating the agreements. However, they asked for prices, which could not be agreed by Dhaka.

Amidst a projected shortfall of 15 lakh tonnes of rice this year, the food ministry desperately sought to buy rice from Thailand and India under government-to-government arrangements, weeks after signing a G2G deal to import the staple from Vietnam.

"The Thai delegation that visited Bangladesh from July 23 to 24 asked for a price that we couldn't agree. We asked them to lower the price,” Badrul Hasan, director general of the food directorate, told The Daily Star yesterday.

"We'll go for it if their new offer is competitive," he said. 

Meanwhile, Thai Rice Exporters Association's Honorary President Chookiat Ophaswongse told news agency Reuters on Thursday that "Thailand will submit a new offer. The deal is not totally off."

Earlier, an Indian delegation also demanded high prices that Bangladesh did not agree, said Badrul.

He said, "These price offers are way higher than the prices international rice suppliers are quoting against the import tenders we've floated."

Following this year's crop loss owing to Haor flashfloods and fungal attacks (rice blast), the government approved a 2.5 lakh tonnes of rice import from Vietnam in mid-June for replenishing stock in public granaries that slipped to a six-year low.

Besides, the food directorate floated six international tenders in the last two months to buy three lakh tonnes of rice.

These moves came at a time when domestic retail markets saw a 47 percent hike in prices of coarse rice in June this year comparing to that of last year.

Bangladesh, the world's fourth largest rice producer, has emerged as a major importer of the staple this year due to the depleted stocks and record local prices following the flashfloods.

Official sources said prices of rice, now under the import pipeline, ranged between $400 to $470 a tonne. But both India and Thailand are asking Bangladesh to pay $500.

Badrul told The Daily Star, "We're going to Cambodia this Tuesday and see if we get a competitive price offer there. There is no desperation as our stock is now being gradually replenished with Vietnamese rice reaching our ports."  

Apart from this, private traders have imported 1.22 lakh tonnes of rice, mostly from India, since July 1 after the import duty was lowered to 10 percent from 28 percent.

Yet, the rice market remains volatile with prices of largely consumed coarse rice still hovering around Tk 43 to 45 a kilogram, down by just Tk 2 to 3 from their peaks in June in Dhaka's retail markets.   

 In this backdrop, the government is now looking to import at least two to three lakh tonnes of the staple from Cambodia, which produces more than nine million tonnes of rice a year with a third to spare for export.