Boro procurement drive in northern dists faces setback
Boro procurement drive faces serious setback in northern districts due to higher prices of paddy and rice in local markets compared to the official procurement rates.
According to our correspondent in Rangpur, the government is yet to achieve one-fourth of the boro rice procurement target in the last 50 days.
The contact dealers who were supposed to make available boro rice at Tk 27 per kg this year have almost stopped supplying the crop to the government.
They have appealed to the department concerned to increase the rate by at least Tk 3-4 per kg so that they can survive with minimum profit. But the authorities are yet to respond to their request, said convener of Rangpur Rice Mill Owners Association Nazrul Huq Bosunia.
This year the food offices in the districts have been asked to procure boro paddy directly from the farmers and boro rice from the contact rice dealers who own rice mills.
Accordingly, 172 rice millers out of 193 in Rangpur district signed the contact papers.
The procurement drive began on May 01 with a target to collect 4000 metric tones (mt) of boro paddy and 38,171 mt of boro rice by 31 August this year in the district. The rate of boro paddy was fixed at Tk 17 per kg while boro rice at Tk 25 per kg.
Bosunia said the price of boro paddy marked a steady rise in Rangpur markets following announcement of procurement rate by the government.
He said the procurement rate is profitable for the farmers but it affects the contact rice dealers.
Contact rice dealer of Rangpur Sadar upazila Nurul Islam Bablu said, “We get about 24 kgs of rice from one maund of paddy. One maund of boro paddy is sold at Tk 650 to 680 in the markets. Thus one kg of rice stands at Tk 28.50 including the cost of husking.”
This is why the contact rice dealers requested the government to hike the procurement rate of boro rice, Bablu explained.
Sources at Rangpur food office said a little more than 2400 mt of boro paddy and 6000 mt of boro rice was purchased from May 1 till yesterday.
District food department sources in Chuadanga said boro paddy and rice procurement drive in the district was facing serious setback, reports UNB.
The boro procurement drive began on May 1 with the target of collecting 6,484 metric tonnes of paddy and 1,319 mts of rice in the district.
Food department sources said only around 40 rice mill owners, out of 150, made agreement with the food department till end of May.
So far 13.07 mts of paddy was collected in Jibannagar and Alamdanga upazila food godowns in May but no rice was procured.
Farmers in the district said, as the government fixed price is lower than the market price they are not interested to sell paddy and rice to the food department.
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