Rice imports drop to four-decade low
Bangladesh's rice imports fell to a good nearly 40-year lower in the fiscal year 2019-20 because of farmers' endeavour to improve the yields of the main crop and allow the country to be self-sufficient found in the cereal production.
Total import was 4,180 tonnes within the last fiscal year, marking a 98 % slump over the prior fiscal year, caused by high import tariffs and enough domestic production, foodstuff ministry data showed.
Agricultural analysts attributed the gain to soaring production amid farmers' gradual change to much better varieties and replacement of elderly varieties by the newer kinds. And these were reinforced by favourable climate, better crop management and subsidies targeted at keeping the prices of fertilizers affordable for growers.
Annual rice output, that was significantly less than 3 crore tonnes until the fiscal year 2007-08, crossed the mark on the subsequent year. Since then, upward trajectory continued aside from the fiscal calendar year 2016-17 when floods in the northeastern haor region damaged crops.
Production recovered a 12 months later but encouraged by low import duty, private importers earned 38.90 lakh tonnes of the cereal in FY2017-18, the best in almost three decades.
Total yearly rice production stood at 3.64 crore tonnes in FY2018-19, posting a marginal boost over the previous year. The production estimate going back fiscal year is but to be made obtainable by the Bangladesh Bureau of Figures.
However, the meals and Agriculture Organisation, in a written report in Might, said the united states was expected to have produced 3.87 crore tonnes of rice in FY2019-20. Bangladesh consumes 3.2 crore tonnes of rice and 55 lakh tonnes of wheat annually, explained the UN firm in the report.
"Without doubt, Bangladesh has manufactured tremendous improvement in rice development and food security," said Humnath Bhandari, the representative for Bangladesh in the International Rice Analysis Institute, within an email reply recently.
"Rice production this year has been excellent mainly due to favourable weather conditions in boro and hoping very good aman production (if no natural calamities) consequently of a good cost of rice and federal government efforts to improve rice production."
Farmers have been generating an increased amount of rice than the country's annual requirement of the last several years.
"As a result, the country sees carryover stock every year," explained Md Shahjahan Kabir, director-standard of the Bangladesh Rice Exploration Institute.
Rice production has grown by 600,000 tonnes annually since 2009 and the total amount was higher than the annual increase in demand for rice by 3 lakh to 3.5 lakh tonnes due to population growth.
"You don't have to think of import. We are making more food than required," Kabir said.
Aromatic rice applied for festivals and at hotels and restaurants is principally imported now.
Practically 39 lakh tonnes of rice were imported in FY2018-19. There would have been no problem possessed there been no import of the staple grain, said Agriculture Secretary Md Nasiruzzaman.
"Figures show that people aren't only self-sufficient, but we as well produced a big surplus in FY2019-20," stated Subash Dasgupta, a former senior complex officer of the FAO.
"The major burning issue in this development is making the system sustainable. As of late, the current rice production system is becoming extra unstable," he stated in an email reply.
Before, he said, the major concern of development instability was linked to the unpredictability of monsoon.
"However, found in 2017, we witnessed development vulnerabilities in every three rice growing periods -- aus, aman and boro -- which pose alarming outcomes," he said.
"A very important indicate note is that the growth rate in rice development has been decelerating."
For instance, Dasgupta said, rice efficiency rose by 2.3 % per year in the first 10 years of the brand new millennium and slowed down to 0.87 % in the past 10 years from 2011 to 2019.
A rice self-sufficient country must have continuously increasing growth in rice productivity, alongside a competitive and steady production program, Dasgupta said.
As a result of current coronavirus pandemic, a substantial percentage of the populace will fall below the poverty collection, leading to increased rice consumption included in this.
Regarding to IRRI Representative Bhandari, there are issues in future rice creation such as for example flood, drought, salinity, wintry and heat.
Agriculture Secretary Nasiruzzaman said the government has prepared a good rice vision to create enough to meet up the national need by 2050.
The authorities targets to create 5 crore tonnes of rice beneath the vision.
The vision lays out ways the way the country increase production based on the population growth against the background of a decline in farmland. "A great way would be to increase yield by variety replacing," the secretary said.
The Rice Vision made by the BRRI in 2015 said the populace of Bangladesh will reach 21.54 crore in 2050 when 4.46 crore tonnes of rice will be required.
The vision paper said several hurdles, such as increasing population, reducing resources and rising climate vulnerability, can stand in the way of achieving the target.
Three major interventions -- accelerating genetic gain, minimising yield gap and curtailing adoption lag -- are proposed to break the barriers to attain the target.
Key challenges facing the implementation of the interventions include shrinking net cropped area, scarcity of water for irrigation and increasing pressure in soil fertility, the paper stated.
BRRI DG Kabir said many improved types of rice have been released lately. In-bred varieties with the capacity of withstanding stresses such as for example drought, flood and salinity are also released. "We have countless draught-, flood- and salinity-tolerant rice seeds already in the field. We have replacement types of mega kinds," he said, adding that the mark has been set to achieve 25-30 lakh tonnes of surplus rice.
