The price of rice should drop in the next two months or so when the first crop is ready to be harvested, General Manager of the Guyana Rice Development Board (GRDB) Jagnarine Singh said on Tuesday.
Singh said the price of rice had shot up owing to a number of factors. Among these were the increase in demand, a decrease in production and increase of the price of the commodity on the international market. A bag of the product could set you back as much as $6,800.
Singh said January to March was considered the low-stock period for the mills and this caused a reduction in rice production. “There is enough for the country, but the price has gone up,” Singh said.
He said Guyana exports about three quarters of the rice it grows and the export price normally sets the trend for the local price. Moreover, he said, the price of rice has been going up on the overseas market – about 200 per cent within recent months. He noted that the price for cargo rice has risen from $235 per gallon to over $300 per gallon.
In grocery stores and in the markets, the price of rice ranged between $5,500 and $6,800 per bag.
He said the Rice Board is monitoring exports and it knows at anytime the amount of rice leaving and what is left for local consumption. According to Singh, the prices are higher in Region Six than on any other part of the coast.
On a walk through one of the City markets, two women explained how hard it was to make ends meet with the high prices.
“You can’t eat the money
