Food ministry trims rice allocation for other ministries
The distribution target of foodgrains through social security programmes including test relief (TR) and Food For Work has been cut by 7.25 lakh tonnes.
The decision was taken by Ministry of Food due to low rice stocks and lack of foreign food aid.
At the beginning of the year, the distribution target was set at 31.37 lakh tonnes. In the recently revised budget, the target of distribution of food grains has been brought down to 24.55 lakh tons. However, about 16.49 lakh tonnes have already been distributed until April. This information has come up in a recent Ministry of Food report. The report was recently sent to the Ministry of Finance.
Food secretary Moshammat Nazmanara Khanum said it is not possible to supply food grains to the Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief because of low food stocks in the warehouses.
She said the Ministry of Disaster Management and Relief is implementing various programs including Food for Work, TR, Vulnerable Group Feeding (VGF).
“Although it is the responsibility of the Ministry of Food to procure food grains for these programmes, but at this point we are unable to support them 100 percent,” she added.
She explained that was the reason to trim the target of those schemes. “However, the ministry is also distributing cash in exchange of food, the Food secretary said.
“The lessened amount of rice would be adjusted by a larger amount of cash,” Nazmanara said.
In the current fiscal year of 2020-21, the government had set a target of distributing 24 .42 lakh tonnes of rice and 8.95 lakh tonnes of wheat. This includes programmes under social security projects and other financial sectors.
According to the report sent to the Ministry of Finance, the distribution target of food grains has been reduced to 24.55 lakh tonnes in the revised budget. This falls short of actual target by 6.72 lakh tonnes. Of this, 16.79 lakh tonnes would be cut from the financial sector and 6.07 lakh tonnes in the social security sector. As a result, the social security sector’s allocation has been trimmed by 3. 61 lakh tonnes and that of financial sector by 3.01 lakh tonnes.
It is learned that despite the increase in the distribution of food grains under various projects including social safety net during the Coronavirus pandemic, rice was not accordingly procured. For an example, in the last aman season, merely 10 percent of the targets of collecting paddy and rice from the farmers were met. As a result, the government has increased the amount of imports to enhance storage. In this context, an initiative was taken to import 1.25 lakh tons of rice from abroad. As per the Ministry of Food, a decision has been made to import 650,000 tonnes of rice from international market. A Letter of Intent has been issued for importing additional 3 lakh tonnes of rice. Besides, 2 lakh tonnes are under import process. Of these total projected import amounts, 2.83 lakh tonnes of rice and two and a half lakh tonnes of wheat have reached the country.
According to the report of the Ministry of Food, the distribution of food grains has been reduced in some large sectors. The target is to distribute 1.60 lakh tonnes of food grains in the food-friendly programme.
In the revised budget, it has been brought down to 6 lakh 60 thousand tonnes. There is no allocation in the revised budget if distribution target was made around 2 lakh tonnes of food under any Food-for-Work (Kabikha) programme.
It was further observed that the VGF relief program had a target of distributing 210,000 tonnes of food but in the end it was downsized to 150,000 tonnes. In addition, the distribution target in the GR program was a quarter of a million tonnes. At present it has been reduced to 52,000 tons. Thus, distribution has been reduced in other programmes, as well.
According to sources, the target for the current financial year is to collect 32.10lakh tonnes of food grains. Of this, 2.25 lakh tonnes was expected to arrive in the country as foreign food grain aid by April. However, no rice or wheat from foreign sources came to Bangladesh until April 11.
Due to Covid-19, relief aid is going to the poor and needy people in various ways. Till March 31, 2.61 lakh tonnes of food grains were distributed under EP program, 3 lakh 26 thousand tonnes under OMS program, 5.94 tonnes under food-friendly programme, 1 .3lakh tonnes under VGF relief programme, 2 .61lakh tonnes under VGD program. In some other programmes, 18 .49 tonnes were distributed.
