Pakistan to export white rice to Indonesia

The Commerce Division is jubilant for getting orders of 50,000 tons of white rice worth $ 22.5 million from Indonesia, after Pakistani companies requested for extension in deadline of contracts. According to an official statement, after bilateral negotiations, the Ministry of Commerce was successful in getting greater market access for its exports into the Indonesian market. The negotiations to get unilateral market access on 20 high priority tariff lines and increased access for our agricultural products were initiated in 2017. These culminated during the visit of the Indonesian President Joko Widodo on 26-27 January 2018.
Commerce Division has further stated that while the notification of the 20 tariff lines will be issued by the Indonesian authorities after completing the official formalities, Kinnows exports have already increased due to longer available time limit for exports allowed by the Indonesian authorities this year.
This year, the Indonesian rice importing agency BULOG, allocated a higher quota of imports from Pakistan. After the bidding process, eight Pakistani Rice exporters got orders for 6250 MTs each totalling to 50,000 MTs. This was announced today by the Indonesian authorities as communicated by the Pakistani Commercial Section, Jakarta. This single transaction will be worth around $ 22.5 m. A list of top 15 rice suppliers has already been shared with BULOG.
"Though responding positively to our request, Indonesian side took a long time deciding and it was February 20, 2018 that BULOG offered Pakistani companies to review their contracts with the new deadline of March 31, 2018," the sources said, adding that this effect allowed Pakistani companies only 40 days for completing their orders. However, after some deliberations, the bid winners from Pakistan again informed BULOG that the time to complete the order is insufficient and requested for further extension. This time they have requested for 50-60 days time period with effect from the date of signing the contract instead of specifying a particular date.
Commerce Ministry expects that after the notification of the additional 20 tariff lines (of Pakistan's top export potential) by the Indonesian authorities, the Preferential Trade Agreement (PTA), signed in February 2012 and became operational in September 2013, will bring more opportunities for the Pakistani exporters, helping in reducing the trade deficit between the two countries.