• Agri. Minister thanks farmers

The Government has saved approximately United States dollars ($) 350 million (Mn) by not importing rice last year (2023), Minister of Agriculture Mahinda Amaraweera said yesterday (14), crediting the efforts of paddy farmers for saving forex that would have otherwise been spent to import rice.

Amaraweera opined that there would be no requirement to import rice this year as well.

Speaking to the media yesterday, the Minister said that the Government had to import 800,000 metric tonnes of rice at a cost of $ 300 million in 2022, but there was no need to import any amount of rice in 2023.

“It was farmers who mostly helped us to save foreign exchange in 2023. If the cultivation were unsuccessful last year, we would have had to import rice. If we imported rice, the Government would have had to spend at least $ 350 million. However, it was locally produced rice that the people consumed throughout last year. We did not import any amount of rice.”

Although the heavy rain has affected paddy cultivation during the Maha season, he said that the Department of Agriculture had informed him that the situation would not have an impact on the overall paddy harvest. As a significant harvest is expected during the Maha season, Amaraweera said that the Government was of the view that there would be no need to import rice this year either.

The Ministry had recently called for a technical report on the paddy harvest of the Maha cultivating season from the Agriculture Department. Since several districts such as Polonnaruwa and Ampara were receiving heavy rainfall in the past few days and reservoirs were overflowing, the Ministry stated that the report was called to find out whether the situation would have any impact on paddy fields that are about to be harvested.