Govt to make country food self-sufficient: Minister
Sunday, 29 March 2009
The government now proceeds with the target of making the country self-sufficient in food rather than turning it food-surplus, in order to avert a possible adverse impact, reports UNB.
"Let us try to be self-sufficient in food production instead of achieving surplus food-producing country," Food and Disaster Management Minister Dr Abdur Razzak said at a seminar on 'Food security and containing price inflation' at Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre Saturday.
Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) organised the seminar as part of their two-day conference on 'Development with Equity and Justice: Immediate tasks for the newly elected government'.
M Syeduzzaman, CPD board-of-trustee member and Bank Asia chairman, former finance secretary and former minister for finance, presided over the seminar.
Defending his comment, the food minister said that if the country produces surplus food-grains, the price would fall dramatically and the farmers would not go for producing the same crop fearing financial losses.
After the seminar, Dr Razzak told reporters that he feared that the price of rice might fall down in the near future.
"We are expecting to have a good harvest of Boro. If we can do this, the rice price will fall again," he said.
But, the Minister forewarned, too much price fall might cause depression to the farmers, who might fail to get proper price of their produce.
"We have to coordinate this issue and ensure that the farmers get fair price of their production," the minister said.
"Let us try to be self-sufficient in food production instead of achieving surplus food-producing country," Food and Disaster Management Minister Dr Abdur Razzak said at a seminar on 'Food security and containing price inflation' at Bangladesh-China Friendship Conference Centre Saturday.
Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) organised the seminar as part of their two-day conference on 'Development with Equity and Justice: Immediate tasks for the newly elected government'.
M Syeduzzaman, CPD board-of-trustee member and Bank Asia chairman, former finance secretary and former minister for finance, presided over the seminar.
Defending his comment, the food minister said that if the country produces surplus food-grains, the price would fall dramatically and the farmers would not go for producing the same crop fearing financial losses.
After the seminar, Dr Razzak told reporters that he feared that the price of rice might fall down in the near future.
"We are expecting to have a good harvest of Boro. If we can do this, the rice price will fall again," he said.
But, the Minister forewarned, too much price fall might cause depression to the farmers, who might fail to get proper price of their produce.
"We have to coordinate this issue and ensure that the farmers get fair price of their production," the minister said.