India-based Amira Foods made the lowest offer of $450 a tonne to supply white rice, including C&F liner out, in a Bangladesh tender to import 50,000 tonnes, which opened on Monday, a food official said. The grain is to be shipped in 40 days after signing the deal, which will take place after approval by the cabinet purchase committee.
The state grain importer issued the tender late last month as part of efforts to shore up reserves - now at 800,000 tonnes and below its target of 1.5 million tonnes. Domestic firm Sunlight Traders submitted the highest offer of $497 a tonne among five suppliers that took part in the tender. The Amira price was $28 per tonne lower than the lowest offer, submitted by Sunlight in the previous tender, which opened on December 26, to import 50,000 tonnes of white rice.
The benchmark rice price slipped to $535 per tonne on rising supply as the harvest peaked at a time of slow demand due to year-end holidays. Amira Foods did not mention the origin of the rice in the tender document, the food official said.
India, which has maintained its ban on non-basmati rice exports, has allowed 500,000 tonnes of rice shipments under a diplomatic deal to neighbouring Bangladesh. The permission helps Bangladesh purchase rice from India through tenders, traders said. The government plans to import 1.5-1.8 million tonnes of wheat and rice in the year to June 2011, against nearly 550,000 tonnes in the previous year.
Two more tenders to buy 50,000 tonnes of white rice and 50,000 tonnes of wheat are due to open on January 10. US wheat scaled a five-month high on Monday as floods in Australia further threatened global supply. The Bangladesh government, already battling high food inflation, has expanded welfare programmes to help the poor. Nearly 38 percent of the more than 150 million people still survive on less than $1 a day.
Queues for subsidised rice are getting longer everyday as prices of grains and other consumables rise steeply in the domestic markets. The low-lying South Asian country produces 34 million tonnes of rice and nearly 1 million tonnes of wheat annually, but it often requires bulk imports to offset shortfalls caused by natural disasters such as floods and drought.
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