Rice Prices
as on :
31-10-2019 01:04:53 PM
Arrivals in tonnes;prices in
Rs/quintal in domestic market.
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Price
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cumulative |
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Rice
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Pilibhit(UP)
|
4000.00
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-11.11
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45212.50
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2600
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2615
|
9.24
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Manjeri(Ker)
|
290.00
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NC
|
9860.00
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3500
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3500
|
NC
|
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Barhaj(UP)
|
170.00
|
13.33
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7283.00
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2400
|
2400
|
6.43
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Muzzafarnagar(UP)
|
80.00
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-5.88
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2350.00
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2755
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2750
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3.77
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Allahabad(UP)
|
60.00
|
50
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1295.50
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2700
|
2655
|
16.13
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Howly(ASM)
|
57.00
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29.55
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577.00
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1600
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1700
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14.29
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Gauripur(ASM)
|
47.00
|
-6
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1903.50
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4500
|
4500
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NC
|
|
Jorhat(ASM)
|
45.00
|
63.64
|
1792.50
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3400
|
3400
|
6.25
|
|
Madhoganj(UP)
|
40.50
|
92.86
|
1888.50
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2300
|
2350
|
2.68
|
|
Naugarh(UP)
|
40.00
|
1.27
|
2648.50
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2480
|
2485
|
9.25
|
|
Sindhanur(Kar)
|
38.00
|
660
|
94.00
|
2000
|
1800
|
40.35
|
|
Ghaziabad(UP)
|
35.00
|
-22.22
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2170.00
|
2925
|
2925
|
7.34
|
|
Lakhimpur(UP)
|
35.00
|
9.38
|
1689.00
|
2420
|
2470
|
4.76
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|
Bankura Sadar(WB)
|
28.00
|
-6.67
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333.00
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2500
|
2500
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-3.85
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Bareilly(UP)
|
26.00
|
-31.58
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1534.50
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2500
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2540
|
8.70
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|
Basti(UP)
|
26.00
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-18.75
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1212.50
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2475
|
2460
|
10.49
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|
Indus(Bankura Sadar)(WB)
|
24.00
|
NC
|
1657.00
|
2800
|
2800
|
NC
|
|
Chorichora(UP)
|
23.00
|
15
|
288.00
|
2475
|
2485
|
10.74
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|
Asansol(WB)
|
22.80
|
8.57
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1980.30
|
3000
|
3000
|
3.45
|
|
Durgapur(WB)
|
22.50
|
7.14
|
1392.60
|
2720
|
2720
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-3.72
|
|
Wansi(UP)
|
22.00
|
10
|
718.00
|
2110
|
2110
|
NC
|
|
Cachar(ASM)
|
20.00
|
-50
|
2940.00
|
2400
|
2400
|
NC
|
|
Karimganj(ASM)
|
20.00
|
-50
|
700.00
|
2450
|
2450
|
-
|
|
Nalbari(ASM)
|
16.00
|
-3.03
|
488.90
|
2500
|
2500
|
NC
|
|
Panchpedwa(UP)
|
16.00
|
60
|
305.90
|
1960
|
1970
|
-12.50
|
|
Fatehabad(UP)
|
15.00
|
172.73
|
342.90
|
2320
|
2420
|
3.11
|
|
Chintamani(Kar)
|
13.00
|
-62.86
|
298.00
|
2700
|
2700
|
20.00
|
|
Vilthararoad(UP)
|
10.00
|
NC
|
721.00
|
2150
|
2150
|
NC
|
|
Tamkuhi Road(UP)
|
9.50
|
5.56
|
519.40
|
2250
|
2250
|
4.65
|
|
Badayoun(UP)
|
9.00
|
-10
|
600.50
|
2670
|
2660
|
18.14
|
|
Khurja(UP)
|
9.00
|
12.5
|
396.30
|
2675
|
2670
|
2.29
|
|
Akbarpur(UP)
|
8.00
|
6.67
|
766.60
|
2450
|
2430
|
9.38
|
|
Dibrugarh(ASM)
|
6.00
|
-14.29
|
280.20
|
3100
|
3100
|
6.16
|
|
Ruperdeeha(UP)
|
6.00
|
20
|
345.00
|
2250
|
2250
|
40.63
|
|
Ahirora(UP)
|
5.50
|
-8.33
|
113.60
|
2300
|
2300
|
NC
|
|
Jahangirabad(UP)
|
3.50
|
-12.5
|
146.50
|
2575
|
2575
|
0.59
|
|
Buland Shahr(UP)
|
3.50
|
40
|
136.80
|
2645
|
2680
|
-0.56
|
|
Anandnagar(UP)
|
2.20
|
-4.35
|
196.40
|
2450
|
2460
|
6.52
|
|
Gadaura(UP)
|
2.00
|
-97.53
|
557.50
|
2300
|
2300
|
9.52
|
|
Nandyal(AP)
|
1.00
|
NC
|
34.00
|
4250
|
3900
|
-
|
|
Ramanagara(Kar)
|
1.00
|
-
|
2.00
|
5000
|
-
|
-
|
|
Alibagh(Mah)
|
1.00
|
NC
|
100.00
|
2200
|
2200
|
-56.00
|
|
Murud(Mah)
|
1.00
|
NC
|
101.00
|
2200
|
2200
|
-45.00
|
Published on October 31, 2019
Researchers double sorghum grain yield to improve food supply
The left image shows the grains of a normal sorghum
plant. The right image depicts how the amount of grains doubled in the genetic
variant. Credit: Ware lab/CSHL, 2019
Plant scientists at Cold Spring
Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) and USDA's Agricultural Research Service (ARS), in
their search for solutions to global food production challenges, have doubled
the amount of grains that a sorghum plant can yield.
Sorghum, one of the world's most
important sources of food, animal feed, and biofuel, is considered a model crop
for research because it has a high tolerance to drought, heat, and high-salt
conditions. Increasing the grain yield has become even more important to plant
breeders, farmers, and researchers as they try to address and overcome food
security issues related to climate change,
growing populations, and land and water shortages.
Led by Doreen Ware, CSHL Adjunct
Professor and research scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and
USDA colleague Zhanguo Xin, Ph.D, the research team identified novel genetic
variations that occurred in sorghum's MSD2 gene, increasing the grain yield 200
percent. MSD2 is part of a gene line that boosts flower fertility by lowering
the amount of jasmonic acid, a hormone that controls the development of seeds
and flowers.
"When this hormone is
decreased, you have a release of development that does not normally
occur," said Nicholas Gladman, a postdoctoral fellow in Ware's lab and
first author on the study, recently published in The International
Journal of Molecular Sciences. "That allows for the full formation of
the female sex organs in these flowers, which then allows for increased
fertility"
MSD2 is regulated by MSD1, a gene
discovered by Ware's team last year. Manipulating either gene increases seed
and flower production.
"Major cereal crops are very
close to each other evolutionarily. A lot of the genes that they share have similar
functions," said Yinping Jiao, a postdoctoral associate in the Ware Lab
and an author on the study. "This gene that plays an important role
controlling the sorghum yield may also help us improve the yield of other crops
like maize or rice."
Ware's lab uses this type of
genetic research to understand how plants have changed over time.
"These genetic analyses
actually give us the molecular mechanisms that provide more opportunities to
engineer crops in the future," she said.
IRRI
collaborates to reduce rice disease
Photos courtesy of IRRI.
10.30.2019
MANILA, PHILIPPINES — In an effort
to be a step ahead of rice diseases that can affect yield and smallholder
farmer income, the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) is
collaborating with partners in the Healthy Crops Research Consortium.
Two recent publications in the
journal Nature Biotechnology describe an integrated strategy
to eradicate diseases that reduce global rice production. This is the case of
bacterial blight, a plant disease that affects large areas in Asia and
sub-Saharan Africa. The research team behind the publication generated
multi-resistant rice varieties as well as a diagnostic kit to recognize new
variants of the pathogen.
According to the IRRI, bacterial
blight is a devastating plant disease that affects rice crops and can cause as
much as 70% yield loss when susceptible rice varieties are grown, and weather
conditions are optimum for its spread. Once rice plants are infected and the
lesions appear, there are no chemical or crop management practices that farmers
can apply to stop the disease.
The Healthy Crops Research
Consortium, led by Heinrich Heine University (HHU), with the University of
Missouri, the University of Florida, the International Centre for Tropical
Agriculture (CIAT), the Institut de Recherche pour le Dévelopement (IRD), and
IRRI, are working together to develop solutions to combat bacterial blight in
rice.
“Xanthomonas oryzae pv. oryzae, the
causal agent of bacterial blight, uses transcription activator-like (TAL)
effectors to manipulate the rice cell and activate the so-called SWEET genes,”
IRRI said. “Those genes are responsible for exporting sugars outside the rice
cell. As a result, massive amount of nutrients fuels the pathogen enabling the
disease to occur.”
In the first Nature
Biotechnology paper, the scientists were able to generate SWEET
variations that can resist the activation by the pathogen.
“Under normal conditions, the
pathogen promotes the leakage of sugars by turning those SWEET genes on,” said
Dr. Oliva, cluster leader. “However, the new variants prevent the SWEET
activation and thus the release of sugar. The bacterium fails to get nutrition
from the host plant and eventually dies. Essentially, this approach aims to
outsmart the bacterium by depriving it of nutrients that it needs to survive
and propagate. We defeat the enemy by starving it.”
According to the first paper,
trials have shown that by making minimal changes at the DNA level to block
nutrient flow that feeds bacterial growth, rice lines, including the
mega-varieties IR64 and Ciherang-Sub1, have resistance to bacterial blight.
These variants have been introduced into other elite rice lines, where a new
class of blight-resilient rice varieties will become available in a few years.
“These variants are naturally
occurring in rice,” said Sarah Schmidt, PhD, from the Heinrich-Heine University
(Germany). “We discovered how to mimic the way plants protect themselves
against invading pathogens, and we used this knowledge to obtain broad-spectrum
and durable disease resistance. The tools that we developed here can help to
completely eradicate bacterial blight disease.”
PathoTracer digital tool interface.
In addition to developing these
disease-resistant rice varieties, the research team developed a diagnostic kit
for rapid pathogen detection and deployment of rice blight resistance, which is
described in the second Nature
Biotechnology paper.
“This toolkit helps us efficiently
identify specific strains of the gene in different regions and make the
breeding process more responsive to local demands,” said Marian Hanna Nguyen,
IRRI associate scientist. “These diagnostic tools include PathoTracer, an
innovative web-based decision support system that will soon be available to
rice growers and researchers in Asia and Africa.
“PathoTracer integrates
early-season pathogen disease diagnostics to accurately define breeding
priorities and guide coordinated actions to manage crop diseases in real-time.
Through these technologies, we want to enable breeders even in remote
rice-growing areas to have the tools in developing resilient rice varieties
that are responsive to the needs of local farmers.”
CRISPR used to edit rice DNA as defense
against pathogen
Altering rice genes the
pathogen needs renders rice strains resistant to blight.
Bacterial blight attacks rice crops in
Southeast Asia and West Africa. It is a very well-studied crop disease, and it
often serves as a model system to examine the interactions between microbes and
their host plants. The pathogen is called Xoo, for Xanthomonas
oryzae pathovar oryzae, and it makes its living by
hijacking a number of rice genes that export sugars.
Now, researchers have figured out how to edit
the rice's genome to block this hijacking.
A TALe of sugars
Xoo secretes TALes (transcription
activator-like effector molecules) that bind to the DNA near the rice's SWEET
genes, activating them. These SWEET genes (Sugars Will Eventually Be Exported
Transporters) are ubiquitous in plants. As their name indicates, the SWEET
proteins transport sucrose across the cell membrane. Their expression is
required for susceptibility to Xoo.
Researchers thought that modifying the rice
SWEET genes would confer resistance to Xoo, especially since natural-occurring
resistance has arisen this way. But thus far, only a few Xoo strains have been
characterized genetically, so it wasn't clear whether it had additional ways of
attacking its host.
In order to see how to most efficiently render
the rice resistant to Xoo—which of the rice's SWEET genes to change, and how—an
international team of scientists first examined 63 strains of Xoo, 33 from Asia
and 30 from Africa. All of them were found to use TALes to induce the
expression of SWEET genes.
As a proof of concept, the scientists then used
CRISPR to edit the DNA near three SWEET genes in Kitaake rice. This editing
specifically targeted the DNA sequences that the TALe proteins stick to but
left the surrounding DNA intact. It's far more specific than could be expected
to occur simply by selecting for naturally occurring variants.
The engineered rice was resistant to all known
Xoo strains. The Kitaake cultivar is a variety of japonica rice
that is optimal for such studies since it has a quick flowering cycle and high
regeneration. In the future, this new resistant line can serve as a diagnostic
test to assess the virulence of any new Xoo strains that crop up.
Testing on crops
Since it is a variety of japonica,
it can also be harnessed to breed the resistant trait into Japanese and Chinese
rice. But it is not ideal for breeding with the indica varieties
that are grown in most of Southeast Asia and Africa.
So next the team used CRISPR to modify two rice
mega varieties—those grown over a million hectares. In paddy experiments, the
edited rice grew normally and performed much like its unmodified parents in
terms of plant height and other agriculturally relevant metrics. Critically, it
was resistant to three representative strains of Xoo. Although encouraging, the
researchers note that these results hardly provide a sound base for going out
and planting fields of the stuff; much more extensive field trials are
required, along with complete sequencing to ensure that CRISPR did not generate
any off-target DNA edits.
Rice has over 20 SWEET genes, and only three
are naturally targeted by Xoo. "Broad resistance to bacterial blight at
the SWEET promoters will not prevent adaptation of the pathogen, and the
durability of this approach will depend on the ability of Xoo populations to
adapt to recessive resistance alleles," the authors sagely note. They
suggest that making large changes in the SWEET gene promoters might delay Xoo's
ability to overcome the engineered resistance.
Businessman duped of ₹3.5
crore in ‘rice
pulling machine’ scam
OCTOBER 30, 2019 20:51 IST
He has filed a complaint against
22 persons
A 34-year-old businessman has
filed a cheating complaint against 22 persons who convinced him to invest ₹3.5 crore in a ‘rice-puller’, supposedly a high-end machine
which international agencies like NASA are interested in purchasing because of
its ability to generate energy.
In reality, such a machine does
not exist. But, the scam has become so widespread that it now goes by the name
‘rice pulling’ scam. It is touted as a device that can not only draw grains of
rice towards itself, but also has capabilities that appeal to researchers in
the field of nuclear energy and aeronautics.
In this case, the gang promised a
demonstration to Syed Saleem for which they sought money to buy specially
designed anti-radiation suits and kits, said the police.
Based on the complaint by Syed,
the Tilaknagar police, on Tuesday, registered an FIR and are searching for the
accused. The businessman told the the police that he transferred money and also
made payments in cash over a period of two years. He realised that he had been
cheated on October 14 when the accused disappeared.
“We have registered a case, but
we think there is more to the story that what the complainant has told us,”
said a senior police official.
Nigeria: Let's Import Rice Into
Nigeria - Vietnam
30 OCTOBER 2019
The Socialist Republic of Vietnam yesterday begged the ruling
All Progressives Congress (APC) to appeal to the Federal Government to allow
its country import rice to Nigeria at discounted rates.
The Deputy Prime Minister of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,
Vuong Dinh Hue, made the appeal in Abuja when he led a five-man delegation to
meet the Adams Oshiomshole-led National Working Committee.
He said the delegation would also meet Vice President Yemi
Osinbajo to present similar demands.
Reacting, Oshiomhole said Nigeria would not accept such demand
from Vietnam, advising the country to rather secure land and invest in rice
production in Nigeria.
He said Nigeria would no longer become a dumping ground for
unwanted chemicals and spoilt products among others, stressing that Nigeria's
borders would remain closed until neighbouring countries learn to respect the
rule of fair trade.
Rice exports
to be increased to $5 billion in five years: Razak Dawood
By APP
October 30, 2019
ISLAMABAD: Adviser to Prime Minister on Commerce, Industries and
Production, Textile and Investment Abdul Razak Dawood on Monday said rice was
the largest agro-export commodity in the country’s export basket with a total
volume of over $2 billion, which will be increased to $5 billion in the next
five years.
He said this during a meeting with
a Rice Exports Association of Pakistan (REAP) delegation, led by its president
Syed Almas Hyder to chalk out policy proposals in order to enhance the
commodity’s export.
The adviser appreciated all the
proposals of REAP and ensured full cooperation of the Ministry of Commerce in
that regard.
He advised the delegation to
introduce new varieties of rice to enhance production and quality by investing
in research and development.
All bottlenecks in rice export
would be removed with effective coordination and cooperation among all the
relevant ministries and departments, he assured.
The adviser said rice export to
China and Indonesia was on an upward trajectory due to additional market access
secured by the current government in those countries.
Razak said the government
intended to take the exports to the highest level ever and for that purpose it
was taking different measures to reclaim traditional markets besides accessing
new ones.
The REAP president appreciated
the current government’s endeavors for boosting exports of traditional and
non-traditional products.
The REAP delegation presented
various proposals for achieving the envisaged target, which included better
farm practices, higher yields through water management, mechanical
transplanting, drying and storage and BMR of existing rice mills.
The REAP office-bearers assured
that the rice would be exported as per quality and standard to the markets like
Iran, Qatar and China where additional market access had recently been gained
by Pakistan.
Gov’t to curb rice imports via non-tariff
measures
Philippine
Daily Inquirer / 04:11 AM October 30, 2019
The proponent and author of the rice
tariffication law wants to limit the country’s rice imports as the downtrend in
palay prices continued.
The call was
made by Sen. Cynthia Villar at the sidelines of the National Food Security
Summit on Tuesday, adding that the move would help local farmers adjust to the
new rice regime as the government helps the sector be more competitive.
The average
buying price of palay hit its lowest in eight years based on government
monitoring and are expected to decline further as the harvest season begins.
Villar noted
that the Philippines produces 93 percent of its rice requirement, while the
rest —estimated at 1.1 million metric tons (MT)—are mostly imported from
Thailand and Vietnam.
“We will try
to lessen importation and limit it to 1 million MT [annually] because that’s
all we need. Let us help our farmers,” she said.
Villar added
that this could be done if the Bureau of Plant Industry (BPI) would be more strict
when it comes to issuing sanitary and phytosanitary permits (SPS), which are
major requirements before traders are allowed to import the staple.
In response,
Agriculture Secretary William Dar said the agency would be releasing a set of
guidelines next week compelling BPI to strictly impose food safety regulations.
This includes updating the bureau’s lists of pests and diseases to look out
for.
Latest data
from the Bureau of Customs showed that about 1.9 million MT of rice had already
entered the country since the enactment of the new rice law in March.
The number
is expected to swell further to 2.4 million MT by yearend and this would be the
highest on record for the country, according to the United States of
Agriculture-Foreign Agricultural Services.
Last month,
Dar also pushed for the imposition of safeguard measures, but these were
rejected by the administration’s economic managers due to their “inflationary
effects.”
Slapping
safeguard duties on imported rice could have been the easiest way to curb the
inflow of imported rice in the market, Villar said, but she said the move would
leave an impression that the Philippines was “scared” of competition.
“We have to
prove that we can compete. If we are going to employ safeguard measures, they
would think that we’ve already given up and that we are not capable. Let’s show
them that we can [compete],” she added.
In lieu of
the safeguard measures, the Department of Agriculture said it would distribute
P5,000 in cash subsidies to 600,000 farmers with one hectare of land or less.
This is on top of the loan programs it opened to rice farmers and interventions
under the rice competitiveness enhancement program.
https://business.inquirer.net/282237/govt-to-curb-rice-imports-via-non-tariff-measures#ixzz63vHZ56iO
Farmer's group seeks
higher tariffs on imported rice
ABS-CBN News
The government should consider
raising tariffs on imported rice to help local farmers compete, Alyansa
Agrikultura says. Farmers are coping with the new tariff-based regime that aims
at bringing down the price of the staple. The duties replaced import quotas.
MANILA – There is no need to
require China to recognize Philippine ownership and sovereignty over the West
Philippine Sea before a joint oil and gas exploration, retired Associate
Justice Antonio Carpio said.
"There is really no need to
demand that from China because if it's a service contract the first whereas
clause of the service contract is 'the resources belong to the Philippines'. In
every service contract we state that's the premise," Carpio explained on
ANC’s Headstart.
On Monday, Vice President Leni
Robredo said the Philippine should not enter an agreement with China until
Beijing recognizes Manila’s ownership and sovereignty over the West Philippine
Sea.
The Philippines and China in
August agreed to form working groups to explore commercial oil and gas
agreements in the West Philippine Sea, which falls inside Manila’s exclusive
economic zone.
National Security Adviser
Hermogenes Esperon earlier said a 60-40 sharing scheme to explore new energy
sources in the West Philippine Sea was “more than fair” for Manila.
Under the Constitution, Carpio said
it should be the government that directly conducts oil exploration, the
utilization and development. But the government can hire contractors to do it
under a service contract.
“What we are saying in the MOU
now with China and the TOR, that's exactly the structure. China will come in as
a service contractor or through a service contractor. When you are a service
contractor like Shell now in Malampaya, they never claim that they own the gas.
They are just a service contractor and a service contractor admits it doesn’t
own it that's why it’s a service contractor,” he explained.
Carpio said the deal with China
can work in favor of the Philippines. He said China would implicitly recognize
the Philippines' sovereign rights over the West Philippine Sea when it signs an
oil and gas service contract with Manila.
In fact, Carpio believes the deal
is a face saving solution for China.
"But of course, China has
more to give because in addition to being a service contractor, China will in
effect not press anything with respect to sovereign rights. They impliedly
accept we have sovereign rights and that's why this is actually the face saving
solution for China," he said.
Meanwhile, spreading service
contracts for the possibility of joint oil and gas exploration to other
countries other than China is also a good idea. This after President Rodrigo
Duterte invited Roseneft Oil, Russia's top oil producer, to invest in the
Philippines earlier this month.
"I think it’s a good idea
because we should spread out our service contracts. We should not limit it to
China alone. We should spread it to European countries, the US, to
Russia," said Carpio.
Kingdom will
export one million tonnes of rice by 2022, says CRF
Thou Vireak | Publication
date 30 October 2019 | 22:42 ICT
The Kingdom exported 538,396 tonnes of rice in 2015, 542,144
tonnes in 2016, 635,679 tonnes in 2017 and 626,225 tonnes last year. Hong
Menea
The Cambodia Rice Federation
(CRF) has committed to raising the Kingdom’s rice exports to one million tonnes
by 2022, its president Song Saran said on Wednesday.
The comment was made at the
Strategic Plan 2020-2023 Consultation Workshop, which was attended by CRF
members, ministry representatives, government agencies and international
stakeholders.
In an effort to attain its goal,
the CRF will export 35 per cent of its rice to the Chinese market, 30 per cent
each to Europe and Asean countries, and five per cent to other markets said,
Saran.
Of that, luxury fragrant rice
will account for 30 per cent of its exports, regular fragrant rice 40 per cent
and regular rice 30 per cent, he said.
“To meet export demand, we have a
special interest rate credit package of $200 million to purchase rice during
the harvest season,” he said, adding that the available funds can buy around
500,000 tonnes of paddy – particularly jasmine varieties – during the season.
A CRF report says the Kingdom
exported 398,586 tonnes of rice in the first nine months of this year, up 2.3
per cent from the same period last year, or 389,264 tonnes.
Rice shipments to China stood at
157,793 tonnes during the period. This was up more than 44 per cent
year-on-year. But exports to Europe fell to 135,471 tonnes, or down nearly 30
per cent.
However, Saran said earlier this
month that after three consecutive quarters of decline, Cambodia’s rice exports
to the European market are expected to grow in the fourth quarter following a
CRF working group’s visit to the EU to promote the grain.
In August 2010, the government
pledged to export one million tonnes of rice by 2015. However, the Kingdom
exported 387,000 tonnes of rice in 2014, 538,396 tonnes in 2015, 542,144 tonnes
in 2016, 635,679 tonnes in 2017 and 626,225 tonnes last year.
The Kingdom’s exports so far this
year have amounted to just more than 600,000 tonnes, with insiders blaming a
lack of funds and rice facilities.
Contact author: Thou
Vireak
Nigeria: Let's Import Rice Into
Nigeria - Vietnam
30 OCTOBER 2019
The Socialist Republic of Vietnam yesterday begged the ruling
All Progressives Congress (APC) to appeal to the Federal Government to allow
its country import rice to Nigeria at discounted rates.
The Deputy Prime Minister of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,
Vuong Dinh Hue, made the appeal in Abuja when he led a five-man delegation to
meet the Adams Oshiomshole-led National Working Committee.
He said the delegation would also meet Vice President Yemi
Osinbajo to present similar demands.
Reacting, Oshiomhole said Nigeria would not accept such demand
from Vietnam, advising the country to rather secure land and invest in rice
production in Nigeria.
He said Nigeria would no longer become a dumping ground for
unwanted chemicals and spoilt products among others, stressing that Nigeria's
borders would remain closed until neighbouring countries learn to respect the
rule of fair trade.
Businessman duped of ₹3.5 crore in ‘rice
pulling machine’ scam
OCTOBER 30, 2019 20:51 IST
He has filed a complaint against
22 persons
A 34-year-old businessman has
filed a cheating complaint against 22 persons who convinced him to invest ₹3.5 crore in a ‘rice-puller’,
supposedly a high-end machine which international agencies like NASA are
interested in purchasing because of its ability to generate energy.
In reality, such a machine does
not exist. But, the scam has become so widespread that it now goes by the name
‘rice pulling’ scam. It is touted as a device that can not only draw grains of
rice towards itself, but also has capabilities that appeal to researchers in
the field of nuclear energy and aeronautics.
In this case, the gang promised a
demonstration to Syed Saleem for which they sought money to buy specially
designed anti-radiation suits and kits, said the police.
Based on the complaint by Syed,
the Tilaknagar police, on Tuesday, registered an FIR and are searching for the
accused. The businessman told the the police that he transferred money and also
made payments in cash over a period of two years. He realised that he had been
cheated on October 14 when the accused disappeared.
“We have registered a case, but
we think there is more to the story that what the complainant has told us,”
said a senior police official.
Pre- and
post-rice trade liberalization law, big traders gaming farmer groups
October 31, 2019
This
June 19, 2017, file photo shows an assortment of commercial rice on sale at a
grocery store in Antipolo City.
By The BusinessMirror Broader
Look Team
RIGHT from the get-go, experts
had projected the opening up of the Philippine rice market as the gateway to a
better life for Filipinos: lower staple prices leading to slower inflation and
lesser hunger.
Indeed, the liberalization of the
country’s rice industry allowed the unabated entry of cheaper imported staple.
As figures released by the Bureau
of Plant Industry (BPI) showed, about 1.614 million metric tons (MMT) of rice
from seven countries entered the Philippine market, from March 5, when Republic
Act 11203 (the rice trade liberalization law) took effect, to October 4.
The BPI data showed over 208 rice
importers were behind the volume of imports. Surprisingly, more than half of
these are farmer-members of cooperatives or irrigators’ associations.
The BPI data also revealed that,
as of August 30, over 120 farmers’ cooperatives and associations applied to
import rice since RA 11203, or the rice trade liberalization law, took effect.
They accounted for 51 percent
(about 1.427 MMT) of the 2.776 MMT applied volume for rice imports, BPI data
showed.
The BPI approved all of these
applications with sanitary and phytosanitary import clearances (SPS-IC): the last
piece of paper that allowed these groups to proceed with their importation.
From NFA scheme to dummy games
BUT one may wonder: why are
Filipino rice farmers importing rice?
Industry sources told the
BusinessMirror this is not the first time rice farmers did. In fact, they have
been doing it for years now, even with the pre-RA 11203 era.
Mario Pilapil (not his real
name), a long-time farmer-leader privy to the dealings of farmers cooperatives,
told the BusinessMirror that importation of rice has been a regular “sideline”
business for these cooperatives.
Pilapil explained that these
farmer groups learned the ropes of “importation” through the importation
programs of the National Food Authority (NFA), the government’s grain trade
overseer.
Since the inception of the NFA’s
“farmers-as-importers,” or FAI, program more than a decade ago, cooperatives
were introduced to the business of importation, including its good side and its
bad side, according to Pilapil.
However, he said that big players
started to prey on cooperatives when the country’s minimum access volume (MAV)
for rice imports rose to 805,200 MT in recent years.
The NFA’s cap on the allowable
volume that every eligible importer could bring into the country gave birth to
the dummy scheme, he added.
Pilapil said a private trader—for
example, one with a cap of 50,000 MT—connives with farmers organizations to
corner additional volumes provided in the importation program.
Farmers’ organizations, in
previous NFA importation programs, were allowed to import a maximum of 5,000
MT.
Unscrupulous traders
PILAPIL said it was by tapping
the allowed importation capacity of farmers’ groups that big rice industry
players secured more control of the stocks coming into the country. Hence, this
allowed these big players to easily calibrate the release of the staple in the
market to maintain high profits, he added.
Further, unscrupulous rice
traders undertake such scheme to take advantage of privileges provided to
importer-cooperatives, such as leniency in documentary requirements and even
tax exemptions, he added.
These rice traders also serve as
the financiers of the cooperatives so the latter can comply with government
requirements for rice importation, such as bank statements, proof of warehouse
and exporter networks.
“The NFA is aware of this scheme
but cannot do anything about it because there was no sanction for selling your
import rights or permits that time,” Pilapil told the BusinessMirror. “It’s
technically legal. They didn’t see anything illegal about it. You applied for
the quota and sold your rights.”
He further revealed that the
dummy scheme cuts across the country; there is even a Mindanao cohort that
engages cooperatives based in that island-group for such business transactions.
To date, that group is still alive and working, Pilapil said.
“Imagine, some of the
cooperatives in Mindanao are in the mountains—way outside the city proper—and
yet they are able to import,” he said.
NFA documents confirmed that
almost all of the rice-importing farmers’ cooperatives today were also
participants in the agency’s MAV programs in the past years.
Source of income
THE BusinessMirror found out that
government regulators were well aware, and even foresaw, that such unscrupulous
scheme would be the inevitable fruit of the original NFA scheme.
Former Agriculture Undersecretary
Segfredo R. Serrano told the BusinessMirror the NFA created the FAI program so
that rice farmers would have an alternative source of income in times of
production shortfall. This was especially during the time that the country was
way below self-sufficiency.
Serrano explained during an
interview at his home in Victoria, Laguna, that the FAI program had two key
goals. The first is to allow farmers to engage in importation and earn
additional money, which they could invest for competitiveness. The second goal
was to expose farmers to the international market and, hopefully, appreciate
price signals.
“The intention of the program was
to lessen the prejudice of importation to the principal sector that will be affected
by the importation, which are the farmers,” he said.
“Technically, the program also
allows the farmers to exercise restraint and control over additional imported
volumes,” Serrano added. “So if they see the market is being flooded with rice,
they can choose not to import, hence, stabilizing prices.”
Inevitable monster
FORMER NFA Administrator Gregorio
Tan Jr. told the BusinessMirror they had foreseen that farmers participating in
the FAI program would just eventually sell their rights to bigger players since
they don’t have the financial and operational capabilities.
But, Tan pointed out, there was
another possibility: farmers entering into joint-venture agreements with bigger
players.
“These possibilities were
recognized. And these were accepted bottom lines,” Tan explained.
“Since the farmers would be the
ones adversely affected by rice importation, then why not give them the
opportunity to make some money out of it? Whether selling rights or entering
into joint venture,” he added.
According to Tan, who headed the
NFA from 2004 to 2006, they wanted the farmers to become the “gatekeepers” of
importation so that they could influence the market in terms of supply and
stabilize farm-gate prices.
No harm, no foul
THE issue of cooperatives as
dummies were not a big issue back then, since the FAI was only a new program
and the players were fewer compared to today, Tan said.
Further, he said the purpose of
the importation, which is to provide additional supply for the domestic market,
wasn’t defeated—whether these be by legitimate cooperatives or by dummies.
Tan said there were also
penalties for unused import allocation since it would jeopardize the whole
program and put the country’s supply at risk.
“And maybe for these
cooperatives, if there is no harm, then [there’s] no foul,” he said. “But now,
I don’t see any reason why farmers would be the ones importing since it is an
open market.”
Serrano said connivance between
unscrupulous rice traders and farmers cooperatives was inevitable.
“Unfortunately, the issuances did
not contain safeguards for abuse or misrepresentation. And this is a perennial
problem in rule-making,” he said.
“When you provide for special
privilege or flexibility for something, a positive action, in the absence of
safeguards, leads to a lot of abuses,” he added.
Entrepreneurship
UNIVERSITY of Asia and the
Pacific (UAP) Center for Food and Agribusiness Senior Management Specialist
Senen U. Reyes explained that the aim of the FAI was to pave the way for
farmers to become “agri-entrepreneurs.”
Through this program, farmers
organizations (FOs), multipurpose cooperatives and irrigators’ associations
participated in the NFA’s out-quota rice importation program for the private
sector.
Reyes, who occupied various
positions at the NFA prior to joining the academe, echoed Serrano’s view. He
explained that, at that time, the government wanted to help farmers directly
access the international market and give them exposure on the rice economy
through importation.
The primary loophole in the
program is the farmer organizations’ capacity or capability to import. Reyes
said these groups, along with cooperatives, “may not have the financial
capability and administrative skills to comply with the requirements.”
“This flaw may have been taken
advantage of by some private sectors who ‘assisted’ farmers organizations in
qualifying for import permits,” Reyes told the BusinessMirror. He said there
are anecdotes that some of these organizations are being given, “and became
content with, a few pesos as fee per bag or lumpsum amount offered by private
financiers.”
Reyes explained there are two
reasons why farmers’ organizations, multipurpose cooperatives and irrigators’
associations continued to import. For one, they may have already reached a
certain level of maturity that allowed them to compete. For another, “the usual
financiers/importers” continued to act as their backers.
In return, Reyes said, these
financiers are able to get the supply they need while hiding behind the tax
perks enjoyed by the cooperatives.
Sans surges, smuggling
REYES said the total imports of
cooperatives ranged from 50 tons to as much as 31,479 tons as of August 30,
based on data from the BPI.
He reckoned that based on their
NFA import permits of 260 tons at $400 per ton, freight on board (FOB), this
could mean at least P5.2 million in cost for 5,200 bags of rice. This does not
yet include insurance, freight, tariff, trucking and storage costs.
Considering the costs of
importation, Reyes said it would be imperative for the government to validate
the credentials and capabilities of farmers’ organizations, multipurpose
cooperatives and irrigators’ associations, in order to distinguish between
those who are legitimate and those who do their business without suspicion.
“It is unfortunate that farmers’
organizations and co-ops are being used, and this practice must be stopped.
This is not something new. However, with the RTL [rice trade liberalization],
it may not make sense to perpetuate this practice as importation is open to all
interested parties without import volume and timing restrictions,” Reyes said.
“Hopefully when the situation has normalized, import volume and price movements
will be driven by supply and demand sans surges and smuggling.”
Spawned an industry
MONETARY Board Member Bruce
Tolentino agrees with Reyes, saying that instead of empowering farmers, the
system that allowed cooperatives to import rice “spawned an industry where the
licenses were sold.”
Tolentino said this was one of
the reasons cited to justify the removal of NFA’s regulatory functions under
the RTL law. He said the NFA’s powers to grant licenses is one of the issues
why the rice sector has “distorted” the rice trade.
Unfortunately, these permits
issued by NFA continue to be in effect. Prior to the passage of the RTL in January
2019, Tolentino, who used to be the Agriculture Undersecretary for Policy and
Planning during the term of Finance Secretary Carlos G. Dominguez at the helm
of the Department of Agriculture, said there were already licenses and permits
issued and some have not been used. And these are still being honored by the
Bureau of Customs. Nonetheless, he said, the numbers of these permits have
already declined.
As opposed to the sanitary and
phytosanitary import clearances, Tolentino said, the primary goal was to ensure
health and safety. The clearance did not grant any volume or attempt to impose
price controls on rice imports.
Tolentino said under an RTL
regime, the SPSIC should not only be strict enough to protect Filipinos, but
should also not become a barrier to trade. Otherwise, this would open the
Philippines to trade disputes and complaints from its main trading partners at
the World Trade Organization (WTO).
Practice continued
A PERSON privy to matters
concerning rice importation among local cooperatives explained that many of
these groups do not have the capacity to import and were just “dummies” for
Metro Manila-based traders.
Renato Cruz, not his real name,
said there are over 20 cooperatives who import rice in his province. However,
many of them not only lack the funds to import large volumes of rice, but also
do not own warehouses that can be used to store their purchases.
Nonetheless, such practice is
deemed within the law.
Cruz said that in order to
“purchase” rice, they declare their warehouses as “leased” properties and not
part of the assets of the cooperative. This “legality” allowed these
cooperatives to import rice under the MAV importation of the NFA.
The farmer explained to the
BusinessMirror that importing rice at the time of the MAV allowed cooperatives
to earn substantially. Cruz further said that big traders in Metro Manila pay
these farmers’ organizations, cooperatives and rice millers to earn P50 per bag
of imported rice. The liberalization of the rice trade limited their earnings
to around P3 per bag to P5 per bag. Despite the 90-percent to 94-percent
decline in the payments they receive, Cruz said farmers continued the practice.
It’s better than nothing, he
said. At least under this system, they are able to make P100,000. Before, under
the MAV, they were able to earn millions from Manila traders, Cruz added.
The co-ops’ ironic role
ACCORDING to Cruz, the
cooperatives did not even know who these traders are simply because they also
operated through middlemen.
He said he has alerted the cooperatives
for their role in the steep decline in rice prices: the very reason for the
decline in their primary income, which is rice farming.
Cruz said traders are just using
cooperatives because these groups enjoy privileges granted to them by
government such as tax exemptions. He said no less than the governor begged
cooperatives to stop importing any more rice.
Cruz added that cooperatives are
also submitting legal documents to financiers who use these to continue
enjoying the privileges meant for cooperatives. He said officials of
cooperatives also issue these financiers a Special Power of Attorney.
Cruz said the cooperatives
apparently only saw the income they could derive from such a scheme—and for
them, whatever income that is, is enough, regardless of how much those big
players who are using them are actually raking in.
After all, he said, many of the
co-ops were able to pay bank loans, build offices and even warehouses. While he
does not believe that the cooperatives bought farm equipment such as tractors,
Cruz said he also knew of some officials and members of cooperatives who were
able to buy new cars.
Further, Cruz said that despite
the tons of imported rice being imported in the name of the cooperatives, only
a small volume reach the province. Majority of their rice still come from local
production.
Permit to import
ANOTHER source privy to rice
importation, Ricardo Magsaysay (not his real name), said cooperatives have no
financial capacity to import rice. He even received an offer to buy imported palay
at P70 per sack to P100 per sack.
Magsaysay said currently there is
an “over-inventory of rice” due to the decision of the DA to grant cooperatives
a permit to import prior to the passage of the RTL law. While this has
translated to lower rice prices, many wholesalers are also reaping the benefits
of the RTL.
In his capacity as a businessman,
he was only able to import a small amount of rice because he did not want to
contend with low rice prices when it comes to commercial rice due to the
“over-inventory of rice.”
Meanwhile, a farmer in Luzon who
requested anonymity said that the RTL and big-ticket infrastructure projects
being built in his province are displacing farmers and robbing them of a decent
livelihood.
Arturo Pagkalinawan (not his real
name) said that, with the harvest already small as it is and the price of
unmilled rice very low, many farmers may eventually resort to other means to
earn their keep.
Further, Pagkalinawan said
farmers in his province are still unable to sell their palay or unmilled rice
to traders and the government at this time. This was also a strong argument
against any plans of the cooperatives in the province to import rice. This will
be the cause of the “death” of their own local rice produce.
Pagkalinawan said the prevailing
system in their province still involves traders buying palay from farmers.
These traders are the ones who bring these products to the market. The problem
now is that under the RTL, what the government did was to encourage the
proliferation of middlemen, instead of removing them from the equation.
“For us farmers, there is no
guarantee that we can still continue planting rice during the dry season
because even in the wet season, we are not given any water allocation,”
Pagkalinawan said in Filipino.
Edged out
PHILIPPINE Competition Commission
(PCC) Chairman Arsenio M. Balisacan told the BusinessMirror there will likely
be a large variation in the capacity of cooperatives, millers and other farmers
organizations. This will affect their ability to import rice.
Rice importation, he said, has a
“thin market” where there are only a few players and, more often than not,
volumes matter. The bigger player will always have an advantage because it can
bring down retail costs compared to smaller players who import in smaller
quantities.
Balisacan, who was also an
Agriculture Undersecretary for Policy and Planning prior to becoming head of
the Southeast Asian Regional Center for Graduate Study and Research in
Agriculture (Searca) and Socioeconomic Planning Secretary, said evidence is key
to proving the capacity and capability of these cooperatives and other
organizations to import rice.
However, he said he has already
heard allegations that some cooperatives are being used as dummies. However,
there has never been any evidence proving this claim.
Balisacan said it is possible
that the transaction between cooperatives, rice millers and other farmers’
organizations was purely a “business deal,” which was legal.
Required tariffs
IT could also not be a
competition issue outright because evidence should be established that these
business deals actually had a hand in reducing competition in a sector, in this
case, the rice sector.
Asked whether some cooperatives
could be dummies, Balisacan said in a mix of Filipino and English: “Yeah, well,
we’ve heard that before but evidence is [something] I don’t have, not that I
ask [for it] but it is possible that they were able to get an import quota and,
since they are small, they don’t have the capacity to renew it themselves,” he
said. “So they subcontract it to large firms who already are in business.”
In general, Balisacan said the
RTL law aims to promote more competition where consumers and even producers
benefit. As long as firms have the capability to pay the required tariffs, they
can import rice from anywhere in the world.
The law also serves as a
deterrent to firms or even cooperatives who intend to behave like a cartel or
become a dominant player.
“Now, anybody [who wants] to
import could import provided that the tariffs are paid. And that import could
serve as competitive pressure on anyone who wants to behave like a cartel or a
dominant player.”
Overlords
RELIABLE government sources told
the BusinessMirror that “four big groups” are into the dummy scheme of trading
rice.
These are in Pangasinan, Bulacan,
Pampanga and Mindoro.
BPI data analyzed by the
BusinessMirror showed that Bulacan leads all provinces in terms of applied
importation volume with 603,012.25 MT.
This was followed by Pampanga at
274,388.83 MT, Tarlac at 127,075 MT, Occidental Mindoro at 104,703 MT, and
Pangasinan at 69,830 MT.
An import application by a farmer
cooperative ranges from 50 MT to almost 70,000 MT. In terms of value, the
BusinessMirror estimated this would be worth from P910,000 to P1.274 billion at
a conservative average of $350 per MT.
Serrano said it is not surprising
that rice-producing provinces are also the ones leading the list of rice
importers since farmers in these areas are already well-organized.
“Farmers’ cooperatives are strong
in production areas because they are the ones that are able to avail themselves
of government assistance. In terms of resource and influence endowments, they
are the ones that have the capability and power through their overlords,” he
said.
Face sanctions
IF there are lapses in the
system, particularly on how cooperatives conduct their daily routines,
Tolentino said, this should be looked into and regulated by the Cooperative
Development Authority (CDA).
Cruz said the local CDA in his
province also threatened to impose sanctions on erring cooperatives, especially
if they allow themselves to be used by unknown financiers. He said the CDA
warned that if the cooperatives are found to have misdeclared their reports,
they can be sanctioned.
In July, the CDA warned
duly-registered cooperatives to take “extreme precautionary measures” in
dealing with unscrupulous traders that are into illegal rice trade operations.
The CDA added that cooperatives
that allow unscrupulous traders to use their documents for illegal rice
importation or smuggling shall face sanctions under pertinent laws.
“All cooperatives engaging in
rice importation are warned to take extreme precautionary measures not to be
used by unscrupulous traders/importers in rice smuggling/illegal importation
and other entities/persons to use cooperative documents such as Certificate of
Registration and Permits including other acts not within the provision of RA
9520,” the CDA said in its public notice.
“Please be reminded that such
violation of law shall neither be tolerated nor condoned. The public is hereby
advised to report directly any knowledge pertaining thereto to the [CDA] for
appropriate action,” it added.
Taxes, exemptions
BASED on Article 8 of the RA
9520, “No cooperative or method or act thereof which complies with this Code
shall be deemed a conspiracy or combination in restraint of trade or an illegal
monopoly, or an attempt to lessen competition or fix prices arbitrarily in
violation of any laws of the Philippines.”
In terms of taxes and exemptions,
RA 9520 provides that registered cooperatives that “do not transact any
business with non-members or the general public shall not be subject to any
taxes and fees imposed under the internal revenue laws and other tax laws.”
For cooperatives that do transact
with non-members and the general public, RA 9520 provides that if cooperatives
were able to accumulate “reserves and undivided net savings” of under P10
million, they will not be taxed. But if they have, they will be charged with
income taxes, value-added tax and other taxes stated in the law.
However, cooperatives shall also
be exempt from paying “all court and sheriff’s fees payable to the Philippine
government for and in connection with all actions brought under this Code or
where such actions is brought by the Authority before the court, to enforce the
payment of obligations contracted in favor of the cooperative.”
Heavy price
SERRANO pointed out that it would
be more difficult for the government to police the rice trade today since the
industry has been deregulated.
For one, the NFA has been
stripped of its powers to inspect warehouses and revoke licenses of erring rice
industry stakeholders.
Serrano said the government,
particularly the BPI, should do a detailed verification of the capacity of rice
importers to ensure they are really a viable business for such venture.
“There should be an investigation
over the track records of these cooperatives. Check for indicators of
operational capabilities such as capitalization,” he said.
“If there is a disjoint between
their capitalization and capacity, which could be proven by their books, they
should be excluded from the importation,” he added.
Sen. Francis Pangilinan, a former
Presidential Adviser on Food Security and Agricultural Modernization, said the
government should exert more effort in enforcing its police powers to weed out
dummy cooperatives.
Pangilinan said the government
has all the tools and authority to conduct warehouse inspections and check the
profile of current rice importers.
Enforce the law
PANGILINAN is recommending that
government should “go after the dummies.”
“Enforce the law against those
who are taking advantage of the law, going around the law. Manipulation has
corresponding penalties especially those who do profiteering,” he told the
BusinessMirror “Revoke their licenses and business permits. File charges
against them.”
Pangilinan recalled the time when
the government pressed charges against dummy cooperatives and traders in 2015
due to unscrupulous rice trade dealings. The NFA was then under Pangilinan’s
office and attached to the Office of the President.
In 2015, the National Bureau of
Investigation discovered that some farmers’ cooperatives participating in the
NFA rice importation acted as dummies for unscrupulous rice traders.
The malpractice proliferated as
traders wanted to corner bulk of the import volume and take advantage of
cooperatives’ privileges such as tax exemption.
Further, the malpractice led to
the hoarding of rice stocks since the traders were in control of the imported
volume.
Opposed to safeguards
DOCUMENTS obtained by the
BusinessMirror showed that some farmers’ cooperatives, which are rice importers
as well, opposed the move of the DA to impose safeguard duties on imports last
month.
During the DA’s preliminary
safeguards investigation, eight entities—one rice miller and seven
cooperatives—submitted a templated position paper expressing their opposition
to the trade remedy.
All of the eight position papers
were submitted on the same day, September 24, and contained exactly the same
comments.
Five of the cooperatives are
located in Pampanga, while one is in Mindoro and the other one in Bulacan. The
rice miller is registered in Metro Manila.
Government sources told the
BusinessMirror they were surprised when they received the position papers, with
some saying it was “disheartening” to some extent.
“Why are these farmers’
cooperatives complaining about a measure that is aimed to protect them? So, the
decline in farm-gate prices, due to higher imports, is a self-inflicted
injury?” the person privy to the matter said.
Registered as importer
IN their position papers, the
cooperatives and the rice miller argued that the imposition of safeguard duties
would lead to “tightening of the supply of rice and spiraling of the prices of
rice.”
Further, they argued that it
would “encourage smuggling, as others declare rice as other commodity and with
government losing billions of pesos in customs revenues.”
The BusinessMirror cross-checked
the eight entities with publicly available BPI data and found out that all of
them were registered with the agency as rice importers.
In fact, the seven cooperatives
alone applied for a total import volume of 94,308.33 MT, which has an estimated
value of at least $33 million (or over P1.7 billion) from March 5 to August 30.
As of October 4, BPI data showed
that the seven cooperatives have imported already nearly 85,000 MT of rice,
which is estimated to be worth $29.75 million or P1.547 billion.
Rice imports stifling Ghana's economy - Osafo-Maafo laments
Source: Ghana| Myjoyonline.com| Ama Cromwell|
Date: 30-10-2019 Time: 03:10:16:pm
Senior Minister, Yaw Osafo-Maafo
The Senior Minister, Yaw
Osafo-Maafo, has disclosed that Ghana spent $1.35 billion of its
revenue to import rice in 2017.
Delivering a speech at the
consultation forum on the ‘Ghana Beyond Aid for Northern Ghana in Tamale’ on
Wednesday, the Minister stated that proceeds made from exports
are used to import rice although the country was capable of
cultivating and producing the crop.
“We have natural resources in
abundance; we have arable land and favourable climate. Ghana has no business to
be importing any food from anybody,” he stated.
”$1.35 billion of your hard
foreign exchange for rice is unacceptable and there must be change and a change
now,” he said.
The ‘Ghana Beyond Aid’ agenda
envisioned by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo is a complete package aimed
at propelling Ghana to become a beacon of economic liberty in Africa by 2028.
The agenda details some notable
aspirations for economic growth, industrialisation, governance, and many more.
The Senior Minister also added
that Ghana has enough resources to develop on its own the reason President
Akufo-Addo is advocating for a Ghana Beyond Aid.
“Ghana and Guinea alone control
80 per cent of the world’s bauxite and if well managed, this country could be
the lead bauxite exporter in the world,” he stated.
The minister observed that in
recent times people preferred imported rice, making it nearly
impossible to ban rice imports.
Mr Osafo-Maafo said
for ‘Ghana Beyond Aid’ agenda to be achieved in the agricultural sector,
the country must adopt a programme of production to help support people in the
agrarian sector.
“We have to establish
initiatives to help those who do not have enough capital and provide them with
seedlings and fertilizer” he stated.
Ghana Beyond Aid secretariat
has begun consultations with Ghanaians on the President’s proposed Ghana Beyond
Aid agenda.
The consultation is to seek the
views and suggestions of Ghanaians and to clear questions people may have.
To
that effect, a town hall meeting is being held in Tamale on Wednesday. A
session was held for academia on Tuesday at the University for Development
Studies.
Nigeria's border crisis fuelled
by rice
Bustling borders have come to a standstill, with goods rotting
and queues of lorries waiting at checkpoints in the hope the crossings will
reopen.
The closures were imposed without warning on 21 August - and
Nigeria's neighbours are angry.
What prompted
the move?
Mainly rice. It seems Nigeria was fed up about the flouting of
its ban on the importation of rice over its land borders.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionNigerians'
appetite for rice is insatiable - especially for the dish jollof rice
Smugglers bringing in rice from Benin appeared to be making a
killing.
The biggest contraband route was between Cotonou, Benin's
biggest city, and Nigeria's commercial hub Lagos, which is just a few hours'
drive away.
According to the World Bank, Benin's economy is heavily reliant
on the informal re-export and transit trade with Nigeria, which accounts for
about 20% of its GDP, or national income.
And about 80% of imports into Benin are destined for
Nigeria, the bank says.
Nigeria banned the importation of rice from Benin in 2004 and
from all its neighbours in 2016, but that has not stopped the trade.
Why is rice so
lucrative?
Nigeria is only allowing in foreign rice through its ports -
where since 2013 it has imposed a tax of 70%.
The move is intended not only to raise revenue but also to
encourage the local production of rice.
But smugglers have been taking advantage of the fact that it is
cheaper to import rice to Nigeria's neighbours.
According to the Nigerian
maritime site Ships and Ports, in 2014 Benin lowered its tariffs
on rice imports from 35% to 7% while Cameroon erased it completely from 10%.
Rice import
from Thailand (metric tonnes)
Source: Thai Rice Exporters Association
Neighbouring Benin then recorded an astronomical rise in imports
from Thailand, the world's second-largest producer.
At its height, each of Benin's 11.5 million citizens would have
had to consume at least 150kg (330lb) of rice from Thailand alone.
So it seems pretty clear that the rice was making its way into
Nigeria to meet the shortfall in local production for a country of almost 200
million people.
And Nigerians' appetite for rice is almost insatiable in a
country where the grain is a staple.
There was a time was when it was considered an elitist meal
consumed only on Sundays. But now its affordability - plus the love for jollof
rice - has made it a national dish.
Is it just
about rice?
No. Benin is also a major corridor for second-hand cars to
Nigeria, where there is a ban on importing cars that are more than 15 years
old.
Image copyrightAFPImage captionPetrol
from Nigeria is cheap as it is subsidised - and is smuggled to Benin to be sold
Official figures are difficult to come by, but Luxembourg-based
shipping company BIM e-solutions says an average of 10,000 cars arrive at the
Cotonou port from Europe monthly.
According to the Nigeria Customs Service, many are smuggled
across the border.
The authorities also want to tackle smugglers going the other
way. Many sell cheap subsidised Nigerian petrol in neighbouring countries.
In July, the head of Nigeria's national petroleum company,
Maikanti Baru, said petrol smugglers were taking about 10 million litres (two
million gallons) out of the country each day.
How has West
Africa been affected?
Many goods come in through the port of Lagos and are transported
by road throughout the region by hundreds of thousands of lorries.
Nigeria's immediate neighbours Benin, Niger, Chad and Cameroon -
as well as Ghana and Togo have been hit by the crisis.
Ghana's Foreign Minister Shirley Ayorkor Botchwey said the
country's traders had incurred huge losses because their goods had been
detained for weeks at the Nigeria-Benin border.
She advised the Nigerian government to "find ways of
isolating the issues and the countries that it has problems with, so that
Ghana's exports can enter Nigeria's market without being lumped up with all
these issues that have emerged".
In Benin, photographer Yanick Folly posted images of baskets of
tomatoes, lined up and decaying near the border.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionPhotographer
Yanick Folly posted images of tomotos rotting at the Benin
Benin's Agriculture Minister Gaston Dossouhoui described it as
"a distressing sight" when he visited markets in the town of Grand
Popo.
"It's very difficult for our producers. It's a
disaster," he was quoted by the AFP news agency as saying.
In an effort to mollify its powerful neighbour, Niger has since
imposed its own ban on the exportation of rice to Nigeria.
But it is the border communities, where traders often
criss-cross for market days, that are suffering.
BBC Hausa reporter Tchima Illa Issoufou in Niger said traders in
two border towns she visited were unable to do business as most were not able
to cross the border.
And a long line of lorries, most heavy with goods, stands at
Maradi close to the border with Nigeria.
Is the move
illegal?
The border closure goes against an agreement that guarantees
free movement between the 15 members of the West African regional bloc Ecowas.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionThe
Benin border is a popular crossing for Nigerians seeking second-hand cars
However it is legal for an Ecowas member state to restrict the
importation of certain food and agricultural products - and in 2004 Benin and
Nigeria agreed to ban 29 foreign products from being imported into Nigeria.
Yet Nigeria's actions have many questioning its commitment to
the historic AfCFTA free-trade agreement, which it signed up to in July that
lays the foundation for the creation of the world's largest free trade area and
is intended to boost trade between African countries.
There are those who describe Nigerian President Muhammadu
Buhari's protectionist attitude as "Trumpian".
But Kalu Aja, a financial analyst in Lagos, says the very fact
that Mr Buhari signed AfCTA is proof that he is different from his US
counterpart Donald Trump.
"Buhari is not being protectionist but seeking to protect
the gains made in local agriculture, in rice especially," he told the BBC.
"Keep in mind the sea borders are still open, tariffs have
not gone up. Trump cut taxes, then cut regulations then imposed tariffs on
China, Canada etc."
How has Nigeria
been affected?
In the southern state of Rivers, some traders at the rice depot
section of the Mile 1 market in Port Harcourt have packed up and gone home.
Image captionThe
market in Port Harcourt was popular for wholesalers and retailers of rice
They say the dramatic closure of the borders gave them no time
to stock up.
And prices have gone up too. Foreign rice now sells for 60%
more, while locally produced rice has increased by almost 100%.
But there has been the up side.
Nigeria customs chief Hameed Ali recently told MPs that tax
revenues had gone up as cargo destined for Benin was now arriving at Nigerian
ports.
One day in September, a record 9.2bn naira ($25m, £20m) was
collected, which had "never happened before", he said.
"After the closure of the border and since then, we have
maintained an average of about 4.7bn naira to 5.8bn naira on a daily basis,
which is far more than we used to collect."
What happens
next?
No-one knows. Nigeria has not said how long it will keep the
borders shut to commercial traffic.
Image copyrightGETTY IMAGESImage captionPresident
Muhammadu Buhari (L) and his Beninois counterpart Patrice Talon (R) failed to
resolve the impasse in August
In August, Benin's President Patrice Talon pleaded with Mr
Buhari, on the sidelines of a summit in Japan, for the reopening saying:
"Our people are suffering."
But Nigeria's customs boss has been quoted as saying the borders
will remain closed, blaming neighbouring countries for not doing more to stamp
out smuggling.
Some point to corruption at border points as the main culprit
behind the smuggling, which implicates Nigerian officials as much as those of
its neighbours.
However, as its crude oil exports are not being affected,
Nigeria's borders might remain closed for a while.
Rice planters
must get relief funds soon’
October 31, 2019
Farmers in Palawan are preparing to plant rice in this file
photo.
Rice planters will end the year
on a happy note if lawmakers will immediately approve relief measures when
Congress resumes session on Monday, according to the Action for Economic
Reforms (AER).
The non-government organization
said proposals that seek to provide relief to the “plagued” rice industry may
be taken up at the plenary of both chambers of the legislature next week.
“If fate allows it, relief
measures will be on their way to the rice farmers in time for the Christmas
season,” AER said. While the implementation of the rice trade liberalization
“caused disruption,” AER President Jessica Reyes-Cantos said this is expected
in the short term.
“The best way to help our farmers
improve their rice production is to make the [rice trade liberalization law]
work. The various mechanisms —quality seeds distribution, training, and
mechanization—and the funding provided from tariffs will improve productivity
and competitiveness of farmers in the long run,” Cantos said in a statement.
“Returning to import controls, as
Senator Villar and other legislators suggest, will again lead to complacency.
The decades of quantitative restrictions [QR] did not actually protect our
farmers; their productivity even declined. The QR regime only bred waste,
inefficiency and corruption,” she added.
Cantos urged the government to
immediately put in place a 2019 supplemental budget for conditional cash grants
and palay procurement, and to allot funds for these until 2021.
She said government must allot
funds for short-term social protection measures for farmers, such as cash
assistance, until 2021.
Cantos said the government has
sufficient fiscal space available to provide relief measures. Citing data from
the Department of Finance (DOF), Cantos said tax effort stood at 14.7 percent
in 2018, the highest since 1997. Data also showed that for the first semester
of 2019, tax effort is at 5.6 percent.
Rolling out these fiscal measures
will give farmers time to realize the gains of Republic Act (RA) 11203,
according to AER.
‘Don’t wait’
Sen. Francis N. Pangilinan said
government must not wait for one to two years before using safeguard duties as
a trade remedy against the surge of imports.
“Anything that would help cushion
the impact of imports on our rice farmers at this point should be put in place
[immediately],” Pangilinan told the BusinessMirror in a recent interview.
Pangilinan is one of the first
senators that called for slapping safeguard duties on rice imports after the
farm-gate price of unhusked rice fell by an annualized rate of 30 percent.
He also said imposing safeguard
duties will only be inflationary if the government will not be able to punish
the cartels that are hoarding rice.
“They say if you increase the
duties they would just pass it on. But the supply is already high and they are
hoarding. The government should go after them [rather than forgoing safeguard
duties],” said Pangilinan.
More imported rice were shipped
to the Philippines after RA 11203 took effect on March 5. The law made it
easier for traders to buy import rice by removing the QR on imports and
transforming the National Food Authority into a buffer-stocking agency.
The National Economic and
Development Authority said the law will add some 0.44 percentage points to GDP.
The Neda based this on a 35-percent tariff rate on imports.
With a report by Jasper Emmanuel
Y. Arcalas
Border closure: Rice importers’ loss,
farmers, millers’ gain
October 31, 2019
By
The current high cost of rice in the country has been traced to
insufficient mill and supply deficit estimated at 4.79 million tonnes,
reports BAYO AKOMOLAFE
Inadequate mills and
insufficient local production estimated at 4.79 million tonnes in the country
have affected the price of rice in the market.
The country needs some 8.30
million tonnes of the grains to meet consumer demand.
Currently, a bag of the local
grains is sold between N19,000 and N23,500 per 50 kilogrammes bag instead of
the projected N6,000 envisaged by the former
Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh.
Statistics revealed that the
country depend on imports to support local consumption.
For instance, in 2012, the
country’s ports took delivery of 2.8 million tonnes; 2013, 2.8 million tonnes
and 3.5 million tonnes in 2014.
According to the Central Bank
of Nigeria (CBN), the country spent about $2.41 billion on rice importation
apart from those smuggled from the neighbouring countries between January, 2012
and May, 2015.
Government was forced to ban
the grains importation from the land border in 2015.
However, despite the restriction
in the last four years, findings revealed that the country had imported seven
million tonnes of the grains from Thailand, Pakistan, India, United States and
Vietnam owing to inadequate equipment, mills and high cost of producing the
local grains.
Statistics from the United
States Department of Agriculture (USDA) shows that the country imported 2.34
million tonnes in 2015; 2.3 million tonnes in 2016; while in 2017 it took
delivery of 2.4 million tonnes and 2.2 million tonnes in 2018.
Issues
Regardless of the import
restriction of the grains by the Federal Government, Nigerian markets are still
filled with the grains.
Collectively, the local rice
farmers are only able to produce about four million
tonnes per year.
Finding by New
Telegraph revealed that the country needs additional 34.38 per cent or
2.51 million tonnes of the grains to meet domestic consumption estimated at
8.30 million tonnes.
It was further revealed that
the country depends on 21 large integrated rice mills with a total processing
capacity of 1.22 million tonnes yearly.
The mills are located in Kano,
Enugu, Ebonyi, Kebbi, Anambra, Edo, Nasarawa, Benue, Kwara, Jigawa, Niger and
Kogi states.
Ban
Trouble started in 2015 when
the Federal Government imposed a ban on the commodity at the land border.
The ban sparked up massive
smuggling of the grains to the country through the land borders of Seme,
Idiroko, Calabar, Jibya and some creeks in Lagos and Calabar.
Levy on imported parboiled rice
was raised from 40 per cent to 100 per cent in addition to the 10 per cent
statutory duty at the port.
However, the levy died on
arrival when Benin Republic reduced its rice
import duty from 35 per cent to 7 per cent to attract Nigerian rice merchants
to patronise Cotonou Port, while Cameroon importers enjoy zero import duty per
cent.
Sabotage
Findings by New
Telegraph revealed that some rice merchants were forced to relocate to
Benin where they enjoy low import tariff to ship the grains from Thailand and
other major importers of the grains.
It was learnt that the Republic
of Benin does not consume parboiled rice; 90 per cent of the imports are for
Nigerian markets. Large volumes of the imports are shipped from Thailand,
Pakistan, India, United States and Vietnam to Benin for transhipment to
Nigeria.
For instance, parboiled rice
from Thailand is sold at $421 (N151,568) per tonne or $21.05 (N7,578) per 50 kilogrammes at a landing price as at October,
2019, as revealed by the Thai Rice Exporters Association (TREA).
It was learnt that the
Beninioise Government had already licensed some Nigerian companies and several
other rice merchants who are importing parboiled rice through Cotonou and
Bollore port’s terminals.
It was also learnt that some
Nigerian firms were given a mandate by the Benin authorities to import between
290 and 300,000 tonnes of parboiled and white rice each at 7 per cent tariff
per annum.
Other small scale traders where
licensed to imports 10,000 tonnes each.
In January, 2015, Nigeria
Customs Service (NCS) record revealed that some rice valued at N938.2 billion
was seized from smugglers despite the grains restriction from the borders.
For instance, between January
and August, 2015, N330.5 billion worth of the grains was intercepted by the
service. Also, NCS added that some rice valued at N597.7 billion was
impounded from the various land borders in 2016.
Border closure
However, with the recent border
closure since August, 2019, smugglers have been finding it difficult to move
large grains out of the two Benin ports.
The Customs Comptroller
General, Col. Hameed Ali (rtd), said that since the commencement of the border
closure only 21,071 bags of 50 kilogrammes of parboiled foreign rice were
seized, while 317 suspected smugglers were arrested.
The Managing Director of
Sceptre Consult, Mr. Jayeola Ayodele, while commending the government decision
to ban the grains, said the Federal Government should have subsidised the price
of the grains and supported local farmers so that consumers would not feel the
impact of the ban.
Ayodele said that the
insufficient of the grains was responsible for the high price of rice and other
consumable goods in the market which could be averted if government had
financial backing to consumers just like the fuel subsidy.
He added: “The Federal
Government should have asked famers to sell the products at N5,000 for 50
kilogrammes bag and pay the farmers the balance of their cost of production
before the ban was slammed. They can still do it if they have the interest of
the masses in mind.”
The MD said that Kebbi and
Ebonyi states, as well as multi
Gov’t plans to ban rice, poultry imports in 3 years – Minister
Source: Ghana|
Myjoyonline.com| Oswald Azumah| oswald.azumah@myjoyonline.com
Date: 31-10-2019 Time: 02:10:43:am
Rice importers would be ordered to cease their trade in three
years if everything goes as planned, the Agric Minister has said.
The same applies to persons who import poultry products.
Dr. Owusu Afriyie-Akoto says the government is working fervently
to “establish the local capacity” to meet demand.
Speaking on JoyNews’ PM Express programme on Wednesday,
he said this should be completed in the next three years. After that,
merchants would be expected to trade with local farmers.
Dr. Afriyie-Akoto says the law gives him the power to approve food imports
Currently, most of the rice consumed locally comes from overseas.
Deputy Trades Minister, Robert Ahomka Lindsay had previously said
rice importation alone takes 82 per cent of all imports into the country.
This cost more than $1billion, almost two per cent of the
country’s GDP in 2018.
This must stop, the Agric Minister says.
The government intends, with the help of its flagship planting for
food and jobs programme, to increase the yield of farmers.
This, Dr. Afriyie-Akoto said should be achieved in three years,
paving way for the order to stop imports.
He said this is not over-ambition, neither does it violate WTO
protocol.
Planting for Food and Jobs
The government has been selling fertilisers to farmers at
subsidised rates as part of the planting for food and jobs programme.
The Minister says with 50 per cent government subsidy on
fertilisers for smallholder farmers, a farmer who was previously producing
three bags of rice per acre was now producing 10 bags.
This has massively increased jobs since more hands are needed to
harvest the produce and process same for the market.
The Minister puts the figure of jobs created at 745,000 in
2017 but that number has gone up to 900,000; he says.
Rice
self-sufficiency level fell to 8-year low in 2018–report
October 31, 2019
Different prices of rice are on display at a local store in San
Andres, Manila.
The country’s rice
self-sufficiency ratio (SSR) fell to an eight-year low in 2018, as more imports
flowed into the Philippines to plug the shortfall in domestic production,
according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
The PSA said in its report
published on Wednesday that the rice SSR of the Philippines fell to 86.17
percent last year, from 93.44 percent recorded in 2017.
“This means that 86.17 percent of
the total supply of rice was sourced from the domestic production,” the PSA
report read.
The PSA said rice SSR declined
last year as domestic output shrank while the supply of imports went up.
The country’s corn SSR also fell
to an all-time low last year, according to the PSA. In 2018, the corn SSR was
at 88.43 percent, lower than the 94.34 percent in 2017.
“The drop in the SSRs of both
commodities was attributed to the decreasing local production while there was a
large increase in importation,” the PSA said.
The country’s palay output last
year slid to 19.066 million metric tons from 19.276 MMT in 2017, PSA data
showed. Also, total corn production in 2018 contracted by 1.8 percent to 7.771
MMT from the 2017 record of 7.914 MMT.
The PSA defines SSR as “the
magnitude of production in relation to domestic utilization.” The SSR shows the
extent to which a country’s supply of commodities is derived from its own
domestic production.
“A ratio of less than 100 percent
indicates inadequacy of food production to cope with the demand of the
population; equal to 100 percent indicates that food production capacity of the
sector is just enough to support the food needs of the population; ratio of
greater than 100 percent indicates that domestic production is more than enough
to support the domestic requirements,” the PSA said.
“The higher the ratio, the
greater the self-sufficiency,” it added.
Due to the decline in local
production, the country’s import dependency ratio for rice and corn rose last
year. The IDR, the PSA said, “indicates the extent to which a country’s supply
of commodities came from imports.”
“A high ratio implies greater
dependency on importation,” it said.
The country’s rice IDR rose to
13.83 percent from its 2017 record of 6.56 percent, the PSA said. “This
indicates that 13.83 percent of the country’s supply of rice came from
imports.” “Likewise, importation of corn went up as it recorded an IDR of 11.57
percent in 2018,” it added.
Allow us import
rice, Vietnamese government lobbies Nigeria
October 30
12:052019
Vuong Dinh Hue, the Vietnamese deputy prime minister, has
requested that his country be allowed to increase rice imports into Nigeria.
Speaking on Tuesday during a
meeting with Adams Oshiomhole, chairman of the All Progressives Congress, the
diplomat said his country would like to increase trade cooperation with
Nigeria.
Soha, a Vietnamese news platform,
quoted Vuong Dinh Hue as saying both countries have to strengthen their
relations by cultural and sports exchanges.
Other agricultural items that the
Vietnamese made a case for were cashew, seafood, leather shoes and textile.
Addressing journalists at the end
of the meeting, Oshiomhole said he told the delegation that the government’s
decision to restrict forex for rice importation will not be reversed.
“Nigerians should unanimously back
the decision of the federal government to close the border until our neighbours
try to respect the laws of fair and free trade. Nigeria must not and can’t be a
dumping ground for imported food, imported rice and other smuggled chemicals
and drugs from other countries,” he said.
“I think this is one policy that
Nigerians across the party divide, across primordial sentiments, should salute
the courage of President Muhammadu Buhari in closing down the borders.
“For too long, Nigeria has been a
big brother to our neighbours. Now, that big brother is hurting and hurting
very, very badly. We must secure ourselves as in the way you board an aircraft
that if oxygen fails, and they drop the mask, you help yourself before helping
others. This is the moment. We must close the borders even if we do it for two,
three years, it doesn’t matter. So that our neighbours will begin to respect
the rules of international engagement and trade.
“What has happened is that people
relocate out of Nigeria, target Nigerian market, use our neighbours to
compromise our own trade policies.”
Border closure: Nigeria rejects
Vietnam’s rice importation plea By Francis Arinze Iloani | Published Date Oct
31, 2019 4:31 AM TwitterFacebookWhatsAppTelegram Deputy Prime Minister of the
Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Vuong Dinh Hue The Federal Government (FG) has
rejected plea by Vietnam that its rice should be allowed into Nigeria. Instead,
the FG asked Vietnamese investors to build rice processing mills in Nigeria,
given the country’s large arable lands and potentials in rice farming.
ADVERTISEMENT Speaking at the Nigeria-Vietnam Trade and Investment Forum
(NVTIF) in Abuja yesterday, the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Industry,
Trade and Investment, Sunday Akpan, told the gathering that Vietnam was among
the top five rice producers in the world. ADVERTISEMENT OVER 5,000 NIGERIAN MEN
HAVE OVERCOME POOR BEDROOM PERFORMANCE SYNDROME DUE TO THIS BRILLIANT DISCOVERY
Akpan said Nigeria would welcome collaboration with Vietnamese government and
investors in the area of building rice processing mills in Nigeria given their
vast experience in rice production. The permanent secretary’s position appears
to be a rejection of the appeal of the Vietnamese government that the Federal
Government should allow it to export rice to Nigeria at discounted rates. The
Deputy Prime Minister of Vietnam, Vuong Dinh Hue, had on Tuesday made the
appeal through the ruling APC when he led a five-man delegation to meet the
Adams 
Oshiomshole-led National Working
Committee (NWC) of the party. The appeal may not be unconnected with the biting
effect of Nigeria’s recent border closure and ban on rice importation through
the land borders. Rejecting the appeal, the APC Chairman, Oshiomhole, had told
the visiting deputy prime minister that Nigeria would not accept such demand
from Vietnam, advising the country to rather secure land and invest in rice
production in Nigeria. Oshiomhole said, “If government allows importation of
food, our youths will become idle; that will lead to unemployment. We want to
promote food security. Rather than importing rice from Vietnam, your (Vietnam)
farmers can take advantage of our arable land. We have to do that not only to
protect farmers, but to tackle food security,” he said. The Abuja Chamber of
Commerce and Industry (ACCI) President, Prince Adetokunbo Kayode, in 2017, said
the trade volume between the countries was $303.83m, out of which Nigeria’s
export to Vietnam was $232.65m and imports from Vietnam was $71.18m.
Mending the
cracks in the Benin-Nigeria trade relationship
Wednesday, October 30, 2019 10:49
am
*Photograph taken by Gerald Masila at the Seme-Krake border on
23rd October 2019
By David Luke and Gerald Masila
On 21 August this year, the Seme-Krake border between Nigeria
and Benin was closed without prior notice. This was part of a broader crackdown
by the Nigerian authorities to close all land borders between Nigeria and it’s
neighbouring countries. Today, over two months later, the border remains closed,
with vehicles piled up on either side. Border closures are all too familiar at
Seme-Krake, but this is reportedly the longest closure in about forty years.
This mammoth closure reflects deep fractions in the cross-border
trading system. The cracks at Seme-Krake are particularly deep since the border
feeds the ECOWAS Abidjan-Lagos Corridor.
According to sources at the border, the main purpose of the
closure is to put a stop to smuggling of contraband goods from Benin, which is
compromising Nigeria’s agricultural policies, job creation, revenue collection
and security.
The smuggling of rice is particularly contentious. In fact, rice
is first on a long list of contraband goods issued by the Nigerian authorities.
The country has invested significant resources in expanding rice production,
but these efforts are undermined by smuggling from Benin. The rice entering is
smuggled because it is not produced in Benin. It is sourced from outside the
ECOWAS region and therefore does not meet the rules of origin requirements to
qualify for duty-free treatment. Benin imports rice from outside ECOWAS at
cheaper tariffs than Nigeria, and this rice enters Nigeria through unofficial
routes and is then sold at below-market prices.
A single trip to the Seme-Krake border and surrounding trade
routes is enough to verify that smuggling is a very real problem, that requires
targeted treatment. The blanket closure of the border to all trade is, however,
not the right medicine.
This is because, since the establishment of ECOWAS in 1975, the
region has made significant strides in regional integration. The fifteen ECOWAS
member countries have become one interdependent system. The Seme-Krake border
closure thus has significant knock-on effects.
First, the border closure blocks the trade of every single good,
not just contraband goods such as rice and frozen poultry. This is based on the
ground that trucks entering Nigeria are not adhering to the ECOWAS Convention
relating to inter-state road transit of goods, which requires all goods to be containerised
and sealed at the point of origin until the final destination.
The Nigerian government has kept its seaports and airports open
for non-contraband imports, as they are reported to have the scanning
facilities necessary to inspect all imported goods. But this is not a realistic
alternative for most traders. Key staple agricultural commodities such as
maize, wheat and cassava, which qualify for duty-free status within ECOWAS, are
therefore no longer being traded in either direction. This has negative
ramifications for income generation and food security. It also calls into
question the entire functioning of the ECOWAS Trade Liberalisation Scheme
(ETLS).
The visit to Seme-Krake verified that the majority of the
backlog of trucks on the Benin side of the border are carrying goods that are
non-contraband and not imported from outside of Benin. A female trader with 9
seized coconut trucks complained that her trade had been held up for two
months, which has created huge unforeseen costs and unrecoverable losses.
Second, regional integration has facilitated the development of
cross-border regional value chains. Much of the goods sourced from Benin are
raw agricultural goods, some of which are used to feed Nigeria’s growing
agro-processing industry. This means that the land border closure may in fact
eventually defeat its main objective to support agro-industry and employment.
Without agricultural goods crossing the border from Benin, the supply of inputs
for agro-processing will be lower, resulting in higher costs of production.
Taking the only option of re-routing to seaports or airports will similarly
translate into higher costs of production for Nigerian industries.
Third, hard border infrastructure hides the strong and
indestructible linkages and bonds between border communities on either side of
Seme-Krake. This has given rise to a microeconomy that thrives on informal
cross border trade. This trade is small-scale, fluid and not subject to
official border crossing procedures. Unlike large consignments of formal trade,
women moving with heavy loads of plantain and fabrics on their heads still
cross the border. Yet, this is not without challenge. The time taken to cross
the border has more than doubled, and harassment by customs officials has
increased significantly. Rolling out the recently piloted ECOWAS National
Biometric Identity Card to all cross border communities would help to identify
traders originating close to the borders, who may not have passports or other
official means of identification.
Fourth, Nigeria holds the title of the biggest supplier of
traded goods along the Abidjan-Lagos corridor. The closure of the Seme-Krake
border has cut off the origin and supply of many semi-processed and
manufactured products to cross-border markets in Benin, Togo, Ghana and Cote
d’Ivoire. The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), African
Export-Import Bank (AFREXIMBANK) and Eastern Africa Grain Council (EAGC) are
currently carrying out a pilot informal cross border trade data collection
exercise along the corridor.
Border communities and customs officials engaged in the process
speak to the significant impact the Seme-Krake border closure is having on
volumes and prices of goods traded both informally and formally along the
corridor. Some referred to this as a “chain effect” resulting from the
interconnectedness of ECOWAS economies. If Nigeria’s land borders are not
re-opened soon, it’s neighbouring countries may look to alternative suppliers
to fill the current gaps created by the closure. If this happens, even when the
border reopens, it may be too late for Nigerian suppliers to regain their
market share. This would certainly be a big shot in the foot.
If a blanket closure of the Seme-Krake border is not the correct
medicine to mend the cracks in the Benin-Nigeria trade relationship, what is
the appropriate remedy? Smuggling along unofficial trade routes has
significantly reduced, but as highlighted in this article, this has not been at
a small cost.
Instead, the main complaint of smuggling must be tackled through
specific and targeted measures. The Nigerian government are urging Benin to
sign an agreement that commits the country not to import goods that are
outwardly smuggled. However, effective enforcement of such an agreement would
require the deployment of security forces from both countries along the entire
length of the porous border. This would be a worthwhile exercise, but not a
cheap one. A more cost-effective treatment and one in the spirit of furthering
regional integration would be to fully-implement the ECOWAS Common External
Tariff that officially entered into force in 2015. This would mean that all
externally imported goods would face the same tariff in Benin and Nigeria. This
would go a long way to eliminating the unfair price differentials which
currently incentivise smuggling. At the same time, governments must continue to
invest heavily in transforming agriculture with a view to boosting local
production and competitiveness. This will remove the need to resort to trade
policy measures to remain competitive.
Finally, the cracks at the Seme-Krake border have surfaced due
to much deeper cracks in the implementation of ECOWAS trade policy. For
effective functioning of the ETLS, the Nigerian and Beninois customs
authorities must cooperate to enforce the ETLS, including through joint
operations at the border. If the start of trading under the African Continental
Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), from 1st July 2020 is to work, strong political
commitment and reliable institutional arrangements to keep the continent’s 107
land borders open will be critical.
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Meeting with Iraqi Ministry of Trade Yields Fruitful Discussion
By Sarah Moran
ARLINGTON,
VA -- Yesterday, USA Rice hosted eight officials from Iraq's Ministry of Trade
for a presentation on the quality and reliability of U.S. rice. After
discussing this year's crop, the officials asked questions about available
aromatic varieties in the U.S., ways to conduct sampling that are more
consistent with U.S. methods, and common fumigation practices. USA Rice
also raised the issue again of reintroducing bulk rice shipments to Iraq as a
way of facilitating greater participation by U.S. exporters.
"This is the second time that USA Rice has hosted Iraq's Ministry of Trade in the past two months and we look forward to additional visits so that we can continue to strengthen trade with one of our top export markets," said USA Rice President & CEO Betsy Ward.
"This is the second time that USA Rice has hosted Iraq's Ministry of Trade in the past two months and we look forward to additional visits so that we can continue to strengthen trade with one of our top export markets," said USA Rice President & CEO Betsy Ward.
|
Over
the past six months, 180,000 MT of U.S. rice has been sold to Iraq.
The delegation will be in the U.S. for nearly three weeks as part of the Department of State's International Visitor Leadership Program. In addition to learning about U.S. agricultural commodities, they will review the benefits of open trade regimes and examine global standard practices of administering trade policy. |
|
USA
Rice Daily
Customs intercepts expired rice, other
contraband worth N1.7b in Rivers
By Jane Chijioke
The Comptroller-General of Customs, Col. Hameed Ibrahim Ali on
Wednesday said the Area II Command, Onne Port, Rivers State, has intercepted
another batch of expired rice and other contraband valued at N1.7 billion.
Among the items seized are 20 container of tomatoe pastes
with a total Duty Paid Value (DPV) of N272,261,026.69; 10 containers of
vegetable Oil with DPV of N58,380,528.00; 34 containers of roofing tiles
amounted to the sum of N505,687,096.00; 11 containers of expired rice
totaling the sum of N102,352,800.00; 1 container of machetes with a total
DPV of N36,347,786.00; 9 containers of expired vegetable oil and jam
worth the sum of N117,614,232.00; 1 container of expired baby wipes with
a total DPV of N9,041,714.00 and 1 container of scrap metal amounting to the
sum of N6,043,780.00.
It has recorded a total seizure of 87 containers with Duty Paid
Value (DPV) of N1, 107,728, 944.69.
He said the seizure has been in furtherance to prevent the
importation of harmful and prohibited items into the country, and were all in
line with the provisions of the Customs and Excise Management Act (CEMA) CAP
C45 LFN 2004, Sections 46 and 161.
Alli told reporters that the ongoing partial closure of land
borders across the country has increased smugglers activities who now use the
seaports.
“Let me reiterate our concern and determination to do all it
takes to protect the wellbeing and safety of all citizens and residents by
preventing the devastating effect of these hazardous importation and smuggled
items. They endanger our lives as Nigerians hence will not be allowed to find
their ways into the markets.
“As a responsible Agency, Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) will not
disappoint on its mandate of enforcing compliance by maintaining zero tolerance
to smuggling activities, irrespective of whoever is involved and under whatever
circumstance.
“Let me assure you that a thorough investigation will be
conducted with a view to bringing all connected to justice.
“We shall continue to apply stringent sanctions on any act
capable of compromising our efforts towards achieving better efficiency in the
discharge of our mandate.”
The comptroller-general commended the Area II Command, Onne Port
for its effort to curb smuggled and harmful items as well as its revenue
collection of N89,754,878,264.18 since January.
India Grain:
Spot wheat up on low arrivals; maize dn on weak demand
Wednesday, Oct 30
By Sampad Nandy
NEW DELHI – Prices of mill-quality wheat rose today in the spot
markets due to low arrivals and firm demand from flour millers, as normal
trade resumed today post Diwali, traders said.
Today wheat arrivals in Indore were pegged at 300 bags (1 bag =
100 kg), down from 500 bags on Thursday, traders said. In Kota, arrivals were
pegged at 20 tn compared with 28-30 tn on Thursday, they said. Arrivals
were subdued between Friday and Tuesday due to Diwali.
Prices of the grain are seen falling in the near term as they
have crossed the base price in the government's weekly auction scheme at most
mandis, traders said.
For Oct-Dec, the government has set a base price for wheat
at 2,190 rupees per 100 kg in non-wheat producing states under its open
market sale scheme. The price will be hiked by 55 rupees every quarter in the
current financial year.
Futures contracts of wheat, however, ended steady today on the
National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange as an anticipated decline in demand
from bulk buyers offset firm spot cues, traders said. The November
contract ended at 2,150 rupees per 100 kg.
Prices of maize across key spot markets fell today due to a
decline in demand from bulk buyers, traders said. However, weak arrivals
limited the fall in prices, they said.
In most key spot markets, maize arrivals were lower as supply
was disrupted due to continuous rainfall in parts of Maharashtra and
Karnataka, traders said. In Nizamabad, farmers did not bring the fresh crop to
markets due to low demand for poor quality crop, they said.
Arrivals in Nizamabad were pegged at 300 bags (1 bag = 100 kg),
down 500 bags from Tuesday.
Demand for the new crop is seen weak in the coming days as
fresh arrivals are of poor quality due to high moisture content of 25-30%,
against the acceptable limit of 13-14%, Davangere-based trader Shiv Kumar
said.
Prices of Pusa 1121 basmati paddy fell today due to low demand
from rice millers and higher arrivals, traders said. The new crop has started
arriving in some parts of Haryana and Punjab in full swing, Amritsar-based
trader Ashok Sethi said.
The November 1121 basmati paddy futures contract on the Indian
Commodity Exchange fell nearly 2% to 3,275 rupees per 100 kg. Futures contracts
fell today tailing spot cues, traders said.
Following are today's prices of wheat, maize, and paddy, in
rupees per 100 kg, in key wholesale markets, and the change from the previous
day:
|
Commodity
|
Market
|
Price
|
Change
|
|
Wheat
|
Indore
|
2,200
|
15
|
|
Wheat
|
Kota
|
2,050
|
10-15
|
|
Maize
|
Sangli
|
2,290
|
(-)10-15
|
|
Maize
|
Nizamabad
|
2,020
|
(-)15-20
|
|
Pusa 1121 basmati paddy
|
Amritsar
|
2,800-2,830
|
(-)20-30
|
End
Edited by Maheswaran Parameswaran
Cogencis Tel +91 (11) 4220-1000
Send comments to feedback@cogencis.com
This copy was first published on the Cogencis WorkStation
Border closure: Nigerians consuming expired rice —Customs boss
Published October
30, 2019
Comptroller-General, Nigeria Customs Service, Hameed
Ali
Chukwudi Akasike, Port Harcourt
The Comptroller General of Customs, Col. Hameed Ali (rtd) has
said that Nigerians consuming foreign rice were eating an expired product that
was only polished and re-bagged
Ali also said that the closure of the nation’s border would
attract long term gains, which requires Nigerians to make sacrifices.
He made these remarks on Wednesday during his inspection tour of
Area I Command, Port Harcourt and Area II Command of the Nigeria Customs
Service, Onne.
Ali said the security outfit must reach out to Nigerians through
the media and make them realise the ”deadly” effect of what they were
consuming.
Ali pointed out that the aim of the smugglers of foreign rice
and other banned products was to bring the country to her knees, adding that
the Customs will continue to maintain zero tolerance for smuggling.
He said, ”We are consuming expired foreign rice and when it
causes cancer, we begin to look for who to blame. What they do is that they
polish the rice, re-bag them for unsuspecting consumers. That is what we eat.
”We (Nigeria Customs Service) must reach out to Nigerians
through the media and make them know the deadly effect of what they are
consuming.”
On the closure of Nigeria’s border, Ali stated that the country
would be able to realise its deficiencies and tackle them once and for all,
adding that Nigerians must make sacrifices for the nation’s industries to grow.
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Nigerian Navy impounds 1221 bags
smuggled rice, arrests seven suspects in Calabar ON OCTOBER 30, 20192:32 PMIN
NEWSBY LAWAL SHERIFAT FacebookTwitterEmailWhatsAppPinterestShare By Emmanuel
Una – Calabar A giant wooden boat laden with one thousand two hundred and
twenty-one bags of foreign parboiled rice smuggled into the country has been impounded
by Nigerian Navy Ship, Victory in Calabar The snuggled rice along with seven
suspected crew members was on Wednesday handed over to Nigerian Customs Service
Anti Snuggling Taskforce for further investigation and prosecution.
Genetically Engineered
Golden Rice: A Silver Bullet that Misses the Target
OCTOBER
29, 2019
Promoters of genetic modification
(GM) in agriculture have long argued that genetically engineered Golden Rice is
a practical way to provide poor farmers in remote areas with a subsistence crop
capable of adding much-needed vitamin A to local diets. Vitamin A deficiency is
a problem in many poor countries in the Global South and leaves millions at
high risk for infection, diseases and other maladies, such as blindness.
Some scientists believe that
Golden Rice, which has been developed with funding from the Rockefeller
Foundation, could help save the lives of around 670,000 children who die each
year from Vitamin A deficiency and another 350,000 who go blind.
Meanwhile, critics say there are
serious issues with Golden Rice and that alternative approaches to tackling
vitamin A deficiency should be implemented. Greenpeace and other
environmental groups say the claims being made by the pro-Golden Rice lobby are
misleading and are oversimplifying the actual problems in combating vitamin A
deficiency.
Many critics regard Golden Rice as an over-hyped Trojan horse
that biotechnology corporations and their allies hope will pave the way for the
global approval of other more profitable GM crops. The Rockefeller Foundation
might be regarded as a ‘philanthropic’ entity but its track record indicates
it has been very much part of an agenda which facilitates commercial and
geopolitical interests to the detriment of indigenous agriculture and local and
national economies.
Smears and baseless attacks
As Britain’s Environment Secretary in 2013, Owen Paterson claimed that
opponents of GM were “casting a dark shadow over attempts to feed the world”.
He called for the rapid roll-out of vitamin A-enhanced rice to help prevent the
cause of up to a third of the world’s child deaths:
“It’s just disgusting that little
children are allowed to go blind and die because of a hang-up by a small number
of people about this technology. I feel really strongly about it. I think what
they do is absolutely wicked.”
Just recently, Robin McKie, science writer for The
Observer, wrote a piece on
Golden Rice that uncritically presented all the usual industry talking points.
On Twitter, The Observer’s Nick Cohen chimed in with his support by tweeting:
“There is no greater example of ignorant Western privilege causing needless
misery than the campaign against genetically modified golden rice.”
Yes, that Nick Cohen; the one who cheer-led for
the illegal invasion of Iraq and who remains unrepentant.
Whether it comes from the likes of corporate lobbyist Patrick
Moore, Owen Paterson, biotech spin-merchant Mark Lynas,
well-remunerated journalists or from the lobbyist CS Prakash
who engages more in spin that fact, the rhetoric takes the well-worn
cynically devised PR line that anti-GM activists and
environmentalists are little more than privileged, affluent people residing in
rich countries and are denying the poor the supposed benefits of GM crops.
Golden Rice does not work and opponents are not to blame
Despite the smears and emotional blackmail employed by
supporters of Golden Rice, in a 2016 article in the journal Agriculture& Human
Values Glenn Stone and Dominic Glover found little evidence
that anti-GM activists are to blame for Golden Rice’s unfulfilled promises.
Golden rice was still years away from field introduction and may fall far short
of lofty health benefits claimed by its supporters.
Professor Glenn Stone from Washington University in St.
Louis stated that:
“Golden Rice is still not ready
for the market, but we find little support for the common claim
that environmental activists are responsible for stalling its
introduction. GMO opponents have not been the problem.”
Stone added that the rice simply
has not been successful in test plots of the rice breeding institutes in the
Philippines, where the leading research is being done. While activists did
destroy one Golden Rice test plot in a 2013 protest, it is unlikely that this
action had any significant impact on the approval of Golden Rice.
Stone said:
“Destroying test plots is a
dubious way to express opposition, but this was only one small plot out of many
plots in multiple locations over many years. Moreover, they have been calling
Golden Rice critics ‘murderers’ for over a decade.”
Believing that Golden Rice was
originally a promising idea backed by good intentions, Stone argued:
“But if we are actually
interested in the welfare of poor children – instead of just fighting over GMOs
– then we have to make unbiased assessments of possible solutions. The simple
fact is that after 24 years of research and breeding, Golden Rice is still
years away from being ready for release.”
Researchers continue to have
problems developing beta carotene-enriched strains that yield as well as non-GM
strains already being grown by farmers. Stone and Glover point out that it is
still unknown if the beta carotene in Golden Rice can even be converted to
vitamin A in the bodies of badly undernourished children. There also has been
little research on how well the beta carotene in Golden Rice will hold up when
stored for long periods between harvest seasons or when cooked using
traditional methods common in remote rural locations.
Claire Robinson, an editor at GMWatch, has argued that
the rapid degradation of beta-carotene in the rice during storage
and cooking means it’s not a solution to vitamin A deficiency in the developing
world. There are also various other problems, including absorption in the gut,
the low and varying levels of beta-carotene that may be delivered by Golden
Rice in the first place and the rapid degradation of beta-carotene when
stored.
In the meantime, Glenn Stones
says that, as the development of Golden Rice creeps along, the Philippines has
managed to slash the incidence of Vitamin A deficiency by non-GM methods.
In whose interest?
The evidence presented here might
lead us to question why supporters of Golden Rice continue to smear critics and
engage in abuse and emotional blackmail when they are not to blame for the
failure of Golden Rice to reach the commercial market. Whose interests are they
really serving in pushing so hard for this technology?
In 2011, Marcia Ishii-Eiteman, a senior scientist with a
background in insect ecology and pest management asked a similar question:
“Who oversees this ambitious
project, which its advocates claim will end the suffering of millions?”
She answered her question by
stating:
“An elite, so-called “Humanitarian Board” where
Syngenta sits – along with the inventors of Golden Rice,
Rockefeller Foundation, USAID and public relations and marketing experts, among
a handful of others. Not a single farmer, indigenous person or even an
ecologist, or sociologist to assess the huge political, social, and ecological
implications of this massive experiment. And the leader of IRRI’s Golden Rice
project is none other than Gerald Barry,
previously Director of Research at
Monsanto.”
Sarojeni V. Rengam,
executive director of Pesticide Action Network Asia and the Pacific,
has called on the donors and scientists involved to wake up and do
the right thing:
“Golden Rice is really a ‘Trojan
horse’; a public relations stunt pulled by the agri-business corporations to
garner acceptance of GE crops and food. The whole idea of GE seeds is to make
money… we want to send out a strong message to all those supporting the
promotion of Golden Rice, especially donor organizations, that their money and
efforts would be better spent on restoring natural and agricultural
biodiversity rather than destroying it by promoting monoculture plantations and
genetically engineered (GE) food crops.”
And she makes a valid point. To tackle disease,
malnutrition and poverty, you have to first understand the underlying causes –
or indeed want to
understand them. Walden Bello notes that
the complex of policies that pushed the Philippines into an economic quagmire
over the past 30 years is due to ‘structural adjustment’, involving
prioritizing debt repayment, conservative macroeconomic management, huge
cutbacks in government spending, trade and financial liberalization,
privatization and deregulation, the restructuring of agriculture and
export-oriented production.
And that restructuring of the
agrarian economy is something touched on by Claire Robinson who notes
that leafy green vegetables used to be grown in backyards as well as in
rice (paddy) fields on the banks between the flooded ditches in which the rice
grew. She argues that the ditches also contained fish, which ate pests. People
thus had access to rice, green leafy veg, and fish – a balanced diet that gave
them a healthy mix of nutrients, including plenty of beta-carotene.
But indigenous crops and farming
systems have been replaced by monocultures dependent on chemical inputs. Robinson
says that green leafy veg were killed off with pesticides, artificial
fertilizers were introduced and the fish could not live in the resulting
chemically contaminated water. Moreover, decreased access to land meant that
many people no longer had backyards containing leafy green veg. People only had
access to an impoverished diet of rice alone, laying the foundation for the
supposed Golden Rice ‘solution’.
Whether it concerns The Philippines, Ethiopia, Somalia or Africa as a whole, the effects
of IMF/World Bank ‘structural adjustments’ have devastated agrarian economies
and made them dependent on Western agribusiness, manipulated markets and unfair
trade rules. And GM is now offered as the ‘solution’ for tackling
poverty-related diseases. The very corporations which gained from restructuring
agrarian economies now want to profit from the havoc caused.
Genuine solutions
In finishing, let us turn to what the Soil Association argued in
2013: the poor are suffering from broader malnourishment than just vitamin A
deficiency; the best solution to vitamin A deficiency is to use supplementation
and fortification as emergency sticking-plasters and then for implementing
measures which tackle the broader issues of poverty and malnutrition.
Tackling the wider issues
includes providing farmers with a range of seeds, tools and skills necessary
for growing more diverse crops to target broader issues of malnutrition. Part
of this entails breeding crops high in nutrients; for instance, the creation of
sweet potatoes that grow in tropical conditions, cross-bred with vitamin A rich
orange sweet potatoes, which grow in the USA. There are successful campaigns
providing these potatoes, a staggering five times higher in vitamin A than
Golden Rice, to farmers in Uganda and Mozambique.
The Soil Association says,
despite the fanfare, Golden Rice has not yet actually helped a single person
and if commercialised it will not be helping to reduce people’s reliance on a
rice based diet. It believes that we could have gone further in curing
blindness in developing countries years ago if only the money, research, and
publicity that have gone into Golden Rice over the last 15 years had gone into
proven ways of curing the Vitamin A deficiency that causes blindness.
However, instead of pursuing genuine solutions, we continue
to get smears and pro-GM spin in
an attempt to close down debate.
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