ISLAMABAD, Sept 25: Farmers have demanded of the government to take immediate action against some cartels of rice exporters which are believed to be responsible for an unexpected decrease in paddy price that hit growers severely.

“We have already demanded of the government to ensure Rs2,000 per maund for paddy to protect the interests of the farmers,” Basmati Growers Association chairman Hamid Malhi told Dawn on telephone from Lahore.

He said that the issue had already been discussed with various ministries during the rice board meeting held recently.

“We will again raise the issue with finance minister Naveed Qamar in near future,” Mr Malhi said.

He ruled out the possibility that the decrease in paddy price would lead to any decrease in rice price in the domestic market for consumers.

Statistics showed that the average price of finished rice stood at $1,580 per maund in the past two months, while the paddy price paid to growers was $1,050 per maund.

Mr Malhi said this showed that exporters are making money but are not willing to pass on benefit to growers.

According to statistics, export of basmati reached $203.047 million during the first two months (July-Aug) of the current fiscal year, up by 84.82 per cent from $109.864 million over the corresponding months of last year.

Export of non-basmati rose by 326.49 per cent to $163.535 million during the period under review as against $38.344 million over the same months last year.

This year basmati exports are likely to touch the figure of $2 billion, but only if government did not intervene to interrupt the smooth export of basmati, said the BGA chairman.

Indian basmati rice average price stood at $1600 per maund, he added.

Following the demand from growers, the ministry of agriculture has already moved a summary to the finance ministry to purchase rice through the Trading Corporation of Pakistan (TCP) and the Pakistan Agricultural Storage and Supplies Corporation (Passco). The ministry believed that the move would have a positive impact on the coming crop, as farmers feared that the price of paddy would crash if the government did not intervene timely.

An official source told this scribe that the commerce ministry has strongly opposed the move to intervene in the market.

“We have been asked by the economic monitoring committee (EMC) to discuss the issue with all stakeholders,” the source added.

The target of sowing the crop was 6.2 million acres, which had reached 6.5 million acres this year. Thus a substantial increase in cultivated area would be helpful to increase the rice production, which would reach 6.2 million tons.