Food Adviser Ali Imam Majumdar said that the govt will work responsibly as long as stay.
“We will not leave more or less than the amount of food stocks that should be there at that time before the interim government leaves office after the elections in mid-February. We will leave with sufficient food stocks and that is how we are planning,” he said.
He said these to the journalists after a meeting on food-friendly and OMS programmes at the Chattogram Circuit House conference room on Saturday afternoon.
The adviser said, “We still have about 1.6 million tons of rice in stock. There is about 100,000 tons of wheat in stock. And a ship carrying wheat is currently waiting to be unloaded at the Kutubdia outer anchorage. Two ships are coming from America and Russia. More agreements are being made to buy wheat from America.”
Stating that the Aman collection drive will start at the end of the upcoming November, the food advisrr said, "We have increased the price by 4 taka compared to the previous time in the last Boro season. The government is working to provide incentives to farmers in the upcoming Aman season as well." If there is no natural disaster and the harvest is good, we will try to purchase maximum quantity of paddy rice during the Aman season. We will reconsider whether there is any deviation in our policy so that the rice can be collected directly from the farmers.
He said, illegal hoarding can be of two types, one is if there is no license, it is a legal responsibility to catch it. The other is if there is a license, but the amount of storage capacity has to be determined. If there is a license, but the amount of storage capacity is determined. If someone hoards illegally to destabilize the market, let us know, legal action will be taken.
When asked by journalists that people spend 70 percent of their money on buying food in the market, he said, there is a relationship between nature and production. This time, you see that the price of vegetables is high, there is nothing below 80 taka. The reason for this is that this year's rain is irregular. But when it rains, all the winter vegetables are ruined. Even then, there are administration people here, they should pay attention to ensuring that market monitoring is done properly, so that syndicates or extortion cannot increase prices on various pretexts.
Chattogram Divisional Commissioner Dr. Md. Ziauddin presided over the meeting, and Director General of the Food Department Md. Abul Hasnat Humayun Kabir delivered a speech as a special guest.
Officials from various government departments and journalists from print and electronic media were present at the meeting,
