The government has given permission to 10 private companies for importing one lakh five thousand tonnes of parboiled rice with an aim to control the market.

An authorization letter was sent from the Ministry of Food to the Secretary of the Ministry of Commerce in this regard on January 3.

In the letter, Food Ministry gave the conditional approval to the companies stating that rice, which is not basmati with a maximum of five percent broken grains, can be imported within 10 to 30 days after opening the Letter of Credit (LC).

The 10 companies are - Henna Enterprise of Joypurhat district (10,000 tonnes), Renu Construction of Dinajpur (15,000 tonnes), Kazi Sobhan Trading Corporation of Khulna (10,000 tonnes), Alal Agro Food Products (10,000 tonnes) and Alal Enterprise (5,000 tonnes) of Bogura, Deepto Enterprise of Naogaon (10,000 tonnes), Akash Enterprise (10,000 tonnes), Ghosh Automatic Rice Mill (15,000 tonnes), Mss Nurul Islam (10,000 tonnes) and Jagdish Chandra Roy (10,000 tonnes).

The ministry letter stated that the companies were chosen through evaluation of the applicants and LC must be opened within seven days of the issuance of this allotment.

Companies, who have been allotted 5,000 tonnes, have to market 50 percent of the rice within 10 days of opening the LC and the rest within 20 days.

BDST: 1247 HRS, JAN 05, 2021
AP/SMS