Farmers benefit little from govt's Boro purchase rate

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SM Jahangir
The local farmers, despite harvesting a bumper 'Boro' crop, are benefiting little from the government's current procurement drive as the open market prices of their produce are still far below than the official purchase rates, sources said.
The rice millers are taking the advantage of the official food grain procurement prices, they said.
Such higher procurement prices, however, have raised hope for meeting the domestic food grain procurement target, set by the government for the current Boro season, official sources said.
Under its domestic food grain collection drive, the government had fixed earlier the price of boiled rice at Tk 22 per kg and the rate of non-boiled (atap) rice at Tk 21 per kg for the current Boro season.
Besides, it has also fixed the price of Boro paddy at Tk 14 per kg.
The official purchase rates were fixed considerably higher than that of their open market prices for the sake of the farmers' benefit against the backdrop of falling prices of the food grain.
But the local rice millers, traders and middlemen are gaining much from the official rates as the farmers have little access to the official procurement process.
The local farmers are forced to sell their paddy at a maximum price of Tk 380 per maund or Tk 9.5 per kg in the open markets, growers' level sources said Friday.
Moreover, the prices of coarse rice, which is normally purchased by the food department, are now varying between Tk 17 and Tk 18 per kg against the official procurement rate at Tk 22 per kg, they mentioned.
A source close to agri-business said, "Instead of growers, local rice millers and the middlemen are reaping the benefit of the government's higher procurement prices."
This is happening mainly because the food department like previously is preferring purchasing lion's portion of the targeted food grain from millers instead of the growers.
Official figures showed the government had signed agreements with more than 1500 rice millers to purchase 0.63 million tonnes of rice until June 2 last.
Of the total, about 120,000 tonnes of rice have already been collected until the said date, a senior official said.
"We are hopeful about achieving the food grain procurement target as the rice millers are keen to supply rice to the government mainly because of the better price regime," a senior official of Ministry of Food and Disaster Management told the FE.
Also terming the current collection performance 'satisfactory', the official said the target of purchasing 1.20 million tonnes of rice is expected to be reached ahead of the stipulated timeframe.
On the other hand, a small number of farmers have been able to sell their crop to the official channel due to reasons including the existing 'faulty' procurement systems, inadequate purchase centres and indifference of the procurement officials.
The procurement authorities have, according to official statistics, purchased only 28,000 tonnes of paddy from the farmers and traders against the target of 150,000 tonnes.
Filed-level information suggest that local rice growers have no other option but to sell their produce in the open market at significantly lower than the government-fixed rates.
Experts and agriculturists said although the current higher official rates than the open market prices would help the government to reach its current Boro procurement target, the local farmers would hardly benefit from it.
This is mainly because in the existing public rice procurement rules, the government can buy rice from dealers and not from the growers, which is a big weakness in the system, they observed.
Usually, farmers are able to sell a small quantity of their paddy to the official purchase centres, they mentioned.
They also cautioned that the lower than the expected level of crop prices could create an adverse impact on the cultivation of the ensuing 'Aman' crop.
"Since the farmers, despite harvesting a bumper Boro crop, are being deprived of fair prices from their produce, they may not be encouraged enough to cultivate rice in the coming Aman season," said an agri-expert.