Bulog set to resume rice imports soon

Bulog set to resume rice imports soon

JAKARTA (JP): The State Logistics Agency (Bulog) said on
Friday it would soon resume importing rice in anticipation of
declining domestic supplies in the coming months.

Chairman of the agency's foreign procurement department
Mohamad Ismet said his office would open the tender for the rice
imports later this month.

He declined to disclose the quantity of rice in the tendering
process.

"We are still calculating the volume of the existing rice
stocks."

Ismet, who is also chairman of the agency's tendering
committee, said the agency would use funds provided by the
Islamic Development Bank (IDB) to procure the rice through a
tendering process.

He said IDB had provided US$194 million in financial aid, of
which approximately $63 million had been used, among other
things, to procure staples.

"The imported rice would come from Egypt, Pakistan, Vietnam,
Thailand, Myanmar, China and Taiwan."

A source at Bulog said the agency postponed its rice tender
for 75,000 tons of rice, originally scheduled for June, because
it was reassessing local supplies.

Ismet said rice stocks imported in the 1998/1999 fiscal year
had run out, and the agency needed to replenish its supplies.

The agency has procured about 1.4 million tons of rice from
local farmers, part of the two million tons targeted for this
year.

He said rice stocks were expected to plunge in September and
December due to inadequate local supplies.

Additional supplies would only enter the market in January
when the harvest season started, he said.

Ismet said the government imported more than five million tons
of rice in the 1998/1999 fiscal year, which ended in March. More
than half of that amount was financed by foreign grants and
loans.

The government has projected that the country will need to
import another 3 million tons this fiscal year.

However, Minister of Industry and Trade Rahardi Ramelan said
Bulog was still buying rice from local farmers to boost its
stocks.

Rahardi, also the chairman of Bulog, remained tightlipped when
he was asked whether the agency had any plans to import rice,
only saying it was "his secret".

Rahardi said the country's domestic supply of rice currently
stood at 2.8 million tons.(gis)