Fall in rice prices likely to discourage farmers from achieving Boro target

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Shakhawat Hossain
Falling prices of rice in international and local markets might discourage farmers in their bid to bring more areas under Boro cultivation, which could lead to production target shortfall in the current season, said a government report Saturday.
"In view of the declining trend in the price of rice, farmers may not be as enthusiastic as before and consequently the area and production target for Boro may not be achieved," said a quarterly food situation report of the food and disaster management ministry.
Production target of Boro, the country's single largest crop accounting for almost 60 per cent of the annual food grain yield, has been fixed at 18.01 million tonnes for the current season, which ends in April next.
Quoting the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE), the quarterly food situation report said Boro cultivation area might fall slightly hampering the target.
In the last cropping season, local farmers, encouraged by a record price hike of rice globally, cultivated Boro on about 4.6 million hectares of land, up by 8.21 per cent over the previous season, which helped them surpass the target by producing 17.76 million tonnes of the variety.
The quarterly report said the prices of rice started declining from its peak in April last due to bumper Boro harvest and fall in price in international market.
The rice price dropped further because of release of stock by different stakeholders including farmers before the Aman harvest in recent months.
In the coming months, international rice prices are expected to fall further, especially if wheat prices continue to fall, added the report.
The report, however, said despite the possibility of missing Boro production target the country will still achieve two per cent higher food grain production at 34.33 million tonnes compared with the target of previous year.
The last years' food grain production target was 33.63 million tonnes.
The Bureau of Statistics put the total food grain production in the last season at 29.77 million tonnes despite bumper Boro harvest.
The report said total area under cultivation will increase for Aman rice and wheat by 0.311 million and 0.03 million hectares respectively while area for Aus rice will be reduced by 0.027 million hectares.
Apart from lower yield than Boro production target, the report forecast a drop in food grain import.
Total food grain import in fiscal 2008-09 (June-July) has been projected at 3.13 million tonnes. The government plans to import about 1.63 million tonnes of food grains while rest by the private importers.
Total food grain import in fiscal 2007-08 was 3.47 million tonnes, which include 2.06 million tonnes of rice and 1.41 million tonnes of wheat.
Private import constituted 84 per cent of total import, of which 58 per cent was rice and 42 per cent was wheat.