Afp, Manila, The Daily Star, 10 May 2008

Asia’s response to tightening global grain supplies has aggravated food price inflation and uncertainty, according to an Asian Development Bank report released here yesterday.

Export bans and price floors imposed by grain exporters including China, Pakistan, Vietnam and India “have increased price volatility and uncertainty in the international rice markets,” reducing supplies.

These have been “contributing significantly to the surge in rice price especially since the end of 2007,” the Manila-based lender said.

Among the importers, “precautionary demand for food stocks in many countries is contributing to food grain price increases,” said the report, which cited “sustained procurements” in international markets by Bangladesh and the Philippines.

The report, “Soaring Food Prices: Response to the Crisis,” said “strong political and economic factors ” were at play in the food policies of most developing Asian countries, “so that the effect of sharply higher international prices has not been fully transmitted to domestic prices.”

The bank said crackdowns by Dhaka and Manila on private traders accused of hoarding food grains were “difficult to implement” and have in fact “increased prices in the domestic market of many countries.”

The report also said the “lack of efficient logistics systems and infrastructure for food grain marketing and distribution” has “tightened the market further” in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, the Philippines, and Tajikistan.

The bank announced at its annual meeting in Madrid earlier this week that it will provide 500 million dollars in immediate assistance to member nations hit hardest by soaring food prices.

Longer term, the report urged Asian countries to correct “distortions arising from interventionist price and trade policies,” increased investments in irrigation, related farm infrastructure, and research, and upgrade of drying and storage facilities to cut post-harvest losses of up to 30 percent.

It also called for improved farmer and rural poor access to credit.

The ADB estimates that the soaring food prices could affect a billion people in Asia, home to two-thirds of the world’s poor and where spending on food accounts for 60 percent of total average expenditure.

Bank president Haruhiko Kuroda has also warned that the food problem could cut into decades of economic gains in the Asia-Pacific region.

Staff Correspondent, Bogra, The Daily Star, 13 May 2008

The government will import rice from neighbouring India despite bumper Boro production in the country this season, said Food and Disaster Management Adviser Dr AMM Shawkat Ali.

“If necessary, the government will procure rice beyond the target in this Boro season,” he told journalists while answering to questions at a meeting on Boro paddy procurement and food situation at Bogra Circuit House yesterday.

The adviser said though price of rice have increased in the international markets, Bangladesh is importing rice from India at $430 per metric tonnes as per contract.

He also said steps have been taken to use the godowns of Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation (BADC) to meet the space crisis in godowns.

Responding to the observations of rice mill owners and businessmen that they face problems for power cuts, the adviser said government has already taken measures to ensure uninterrupted power supply for rice mills.

Bogra Deputy Commissioner Humayun Kabir presided over the meeting while Divisional Commissioner Hafizur Rahman Bhuiyan, Bogra District Rice Mill Owners Association President Aminul Haque spoke.

Staff Correspondent, The Daily Star, 16 May 2008

The government will procure one lakh tonne of wheat from the international market at about Tk 32 per kilogram (kg) after failing to buy the grain locally as its market price is higher than the government-fixed price.

The advisory committee on purchase at a meeting yesterday approved the procurement proposal of the food ministry.

The government had earlier set a target of procuring 50,000 tonnes of wheat from local market this season fixing the purchase price at Tk 26 per kg.

Food ministry officials, however, said they could not buy any wheat from local market as the market price was higher than the price the government fixed for wheat procurement, adding that the deadline for the procurement is about to end.

The proposal placed by the food ministry said 70,000 tonnes of wheat would be imported at $ 446 per tonne (Tk 31.22 per kg) through the Chittagong port.

The rest will be imported at $456 per tonne (Tk 31.92 per kg) through the Mongla port.

Finance Adviser Mirza Azizul Islam, who presided over the meeting, told journalists that purchase of wheat at high prices from the international market will not have any adverse impact on the prices of the grain in local market, rather it would help boost wheat supply in the market.

“The market price will be high if the government itself fixes a high price for procurement,” he added.

The committee also approved another proposal placed by the communications ministry for appointing a consultant for its Dhaka-Chittagong Highway four-lane conversion project.

Bss, Dhaka, The Daily Star, 20 May 2008

The government has decided to build a number of new food godowns up to upazila levels across the country spending more than Tk 350 crore in next three years, Food and Disaster Management Adviser Dr AMM Shawkat Ali said yesterday.

“The warehouses will be built under a government project which aims at increasing food stock capacity in the public sector,” he said during his visits to Mymensingh and Netrakona as part of reinvigorating the public sector cereal procurement drive in the districts.

Shawkat Ali said the food storage capacity in the public sector would be increased by two to three lakh metric tonnes after construction of the new food depots at the local levels. The government can now store an average 15-lakh metric tonnes of food in 652 local storage depots (LSD) and central storage depots (CSD).

“The prime objective of the project is to ensure food security in an emergency or any crisis,” Shawkat told journalists, adding steps would be taken to resist millers’ design for hoarding to create artificial crisis.

Expressing his optimism about the success of the ongoing food procurement drive, the adviser said a total of 1.79 crore metric tonnes of rice is expected to be procured from this year’s bumper boro crops. The government would buy crops in line with the market price of paddy and rice, he added.

Millers in Netrakona and Mymensingh requested the adviser to ensure uninterrupted power supply between 7:00am and 5:00pm for rice husking. The adviser assured them of looking into the matter and said directives have already been made to this effect.

The food adviser shared opinions with a cross section of people, including mill owners, farmers, businessmen, food officials and journalists, to know about the pros and cons of the ongoing food procurement drive that ends in August.

Afp, Warsaw, The Daily Star, 08 June 2008

The world’s farmers were bypassed at this week’s Rome UN food summit, reflecting a crucial gap in addressing the crisis at its most basic level, the leader of a global farmers’ group said Friday.

“It’s a reflection of how disconnected and dis-linked our multilateral agencies are, from the situation on the ground,” Ajay Vashee, the freshly- elected head of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP) told AFP at the close of the 38th World Farmers’ Congress in Warsaw, Poland.

“The people who have the ability to actually do something about this crisis were precluded,” Vashee said, adding it was a recipe for “confusion and chaos.” Uniting 600 million independent family farmers in 115 organisations from 80 countries around the globe, IFAP is the world’s largest farmers’ organisation. The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) crisis summit which ended Thursday in Rome pledged 6.5 billion dollars (4.1 billion euros) in emergency food relief and vowed to halve global hunger by 2015 by taking “urgent” action over the global food crisis.