State-owned Trading Corporation of Bangladesh (TCB) will sell 5 kg of rice to one crore cardholders each across the country along with edible oil, pulses and sugar.
According to sources in the Ministry of Commerce, rice will be sold to these cardholders from July 16 this year at the rate of Tk 30 per kg.
The decisions were taken in a meeting last month with Senior Commerce Secretary Tapan Kanti Ghosh in the chair.
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina announced in 2022 that TCB cardholders would get rice at fair price like open market sale (OMS). So, cardholders will be provided rice on a priority basis. Besides, rice will be given to 50,10,509 marginal families at union level across the country under the food-friendly programme.
According to the sources, the Ministry of Commerce and TCB are taking preparations to inaugurate the rice distribution programme. TCB will sell rice to be provided by Food Department.
It is known that Food Department will reduce the sale of OMS and provide rice to family cardholders.
According to the decision taken by the ministry, sale of 5 kg of rice to TCB cardholders will start on July 16 along with edible oil, pulses and sugar.
TCB-designated dealers will sell rice to one crore family cardholders at Tk 30 per kg, sources said.
However, the Commerce Ministry will discuss the issue with the Food Ministry and the Finance Department.
The guidelines for the sale of products will be formulated by respective ministries and agencies. The Ministry of Commerce will hold a press briefing in this regard next week where the commerce minister and its secretary, food minister and its secretary will be present.
In the meeting, Tapan Kanti Ghosh said that currently, three essentials--edible oil, pulses and sugar--are being sold at subsidised rates among one crore cardholders through Trading Corporation of Bangladesh.
The government has decided to sell 5 kg of rice at subsidised rates to one crore families along with three items.
In a meeting on May 30, a decision was taken to distribute 5 kg of rice to TCB cardholders each along with regular items.
An outline has been already prepared for the distribution of food products to the beneficiaries. Food department dealers will provide rice to TCB dealers.
It is known that currently, there is no OMS programme at union level. But there are TCB cardholders at union level. That is why OMS’s subsidised rice will be sold to the poor people at union level as well.
According to the sources in the Ministry of Food and Directorate of Food, if TCB sells 5 kg of rice at subsidised rate to one crore families every month, a total of 6 lakh tonnes of rice is required.
Food Department says that if rice is given to one crore families across the country every month at a subsidised price, the demand for OMS rice will decrease.
But there are still many poor people who have no cards. Although the OMS program is running on a limited scale for them, it is said that the allocation will be reduced a lot.
It is learnt that there are 3,200 OMS dealers under Food Department. The dealers will pick up rice from food department as before and will deliver it to TCB dealers. But TCB will send the demand for rice to food department. On the contrary, rice will be delivered to TCB dealers through Food Department dealers.
The Directorate of Food used to carry out the OMS programme in Dhaka city, divisional cities, district headquarters and some municipalities. Each dealer in Dhaka gets 4 tonnes of flour and 1 tonne of rice in two days. But for sale in OMS, this allocation will be reduced to half or less than half. At the same time, the volume of sales will also be reduced.
At the beginning of the current financial year, OMS had an allocation of 3.5 lakh tonnes of rice and 3.75 lakh tonnes of flour.
But due to the Russia-Ukraine war, the government increased the amount of OMS due to various reasons, including increase in the prices of all kinds of goods, decrease in people’s income and soaring inflation.
The activities which used to be conducted at one or two specific times of the year have now been conducted throughout the year. As a result, the allocation has to be increased this time than planned.
