Dhaka: A European supplier has cancelled deals to ship a total of 80,000 tonnes of wheat to Bangladesh, sources said yesterday, following a spike in wheat prices due to lower crop and export curbs in the Black Sea region.
"We have been informed that two deals sealed earlier for 80,000 tonnes of wheat of Black Sea origin won't be shipped," one of the sources said.
Deals for around 265,000 tonnes of Black Sea wheat to Bangladesh have already been cancelled following the Russian ban.
That has forced the government to switch to importing more rice to build stocks that now stand at 700,000 tonnes, well below a target of 1.5 million tonnes.
The supplier had secured two tenders by the state grains buyer, one for 50,000 tonnes at $244.35 per tonne C&F, and another for 30,000 tonnes at $238.47 per tonne C&F.
Food security is a major concern in Bangladesh, where around 38 per cent of its more than 150 million people still live on less than $1 a day. The government is struggling to rein in food inflation, which is running near 11 percent.
Officials said some 60,000 tonnes of imported rice and wheat were being unloaded at the Chittagong port on Friday, while several more vessels with about 150,000 tonnes of grains waited at the outer anchorage.
The government plans to double imports of rice to 600,000 tonnes this year compared with an earlier plan for 300,000 tonnes, food officials said.
"We are making all possible efforts to shore up emergency food reserves," a senior official said. "A local procurement drive that initially suffered lacklustre response [from sellers] has got momentum finally."
Vietnam's top rice exporter, Vinafood 2, has signed a contract to sell 100,000 tonnes of 15 per cent broken rice to Bangladesh, an industry official said.
Last month the government offered an incentive of 3 taka a kilo to procure rice from the domestic market after millers signed deals for only 500,000 tonnes against its target of 1.1 million tonnes at 25 taka ($0.36) a kilo in the latest harvesting season.
