Govt allows 280 private firms to import 837K tonnes of rice

The government has given permission to 280 private firms to import 837 thousand (8.37 lakh) tonnes of rice as different corporate organisations and unscrupulous traders are allegedly trying to create an artificial crisis in the market of rice across the country, reports BSS.
"The food ministry has given permission to some 280 private firms to import 8.37 lakh tonnes of rice from abroad by August aiming to tackle the artificial crisis of rice, caused mostly by some unscrupulous hoarders in the country," said Muhammad Mahbubur Rahman, Senior Assistant Secretary (Foreign procurement) of the Ministry of Food.
Of the total import, these firms will import some 721 thousand tonnes of parboiled rice and 116 thousand tonnes of non-boiled (Atop) rice, according to an official order.
The private sector importers have been asked to open the Letter of Credit (LC) by this month to import the rice and market it within August.
The government has given permission to the importers and traders of the private sector for importing rice with a 25 per cent tax on the import with a view to ensuring its adequacy in the local rice market.
Some private importers and traders have already submitted their applications to the ministry intending to import the rice.
The importers, who have been given permission, will have to import the rice within a month of opening LC. A portion of the imported rice must have to be available in the market within the next 15 days of the food grains' arrival in the country," he added.
On June 22, the National Board of Revenue (NBR) under the Internal Resources Division of the Finance Ministry issued a notification clearing a Food Ministry proposal to cut import tax for facilitating rice import under the private sector.
Importers would have to just pay only 25 per cent import tax - 15 per cent regulatory duty, five per cent advance tax and five per cent advance income tax, according to the NBR notification. "There would be no customs duty. Customs duty was 25 per cent and regulatory duty was 25 per cent before," it added.
However, the Food Ministry proposed to allow rice import at 'zero tax'. Responding to the proposal of the ministry, the Prime Minister has also given her approval to import rice at zero tax. But, the NBR has given its clearance to import rice paying 25pc taxes in total.
According to the Food Ministry and Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB), retailers are selling fine rice at Tk 65 to 80 per kg, which is up 14 per cent from a month ago. Prices of coarse rice edged up 8.6 per cent to Tk 48 to 53 per kg, during the same period.
At present, the food grain stock in the government godowns is around 1.641 million (16.41 lakh) tonnes.
Of the grains, the stock of rice is around 1.408 million (14.08 lakh) tonnes, 163 thousand (1.63 lakh) tonnes of wheat and 107 thousand tonnes of paddy.