Island Editorial
The government has promised to import rice to bring down prices. It is planning to release 30,000 tonnes of rice to the market within the next two weeks through state owned sales outlets. Nothing exposes the stupidity of the custodians of this country who have ruined the state sector agricultural and trading institutions more than the predicament of the present government and the public. The CWE was the most potent instrument at the disposal of the State to regulate prices but it was systematically enervated and reduced to an empty shell at the behest of private traders who sponsored political potentates. This government may claim the credit for proposing the revival of the co-operative system but precious little has so far been done on the ground.
The government’s decision to import rice is welcome but the question is whether the stocks to come will be fit for human consumption. President Mahinda Rajapaksa will have to ensure that the corrupt politicians and bureaucrats won’t line their pockets by importing low quality rice which will end up as animal fodder. What the people need is not anything cheap but good rice at reasonable prices.
In trying to distribute the rice to be imported through the State owned outlets which are few and far between, the government may be biting off more than it can chew.
Co-operatives are notorious for inefficiency and corruption and the government will find it difficult to prevent long winding queues forming at those places (reminiscent of the 1970-77 era) and the sale of rice to the private traders through the backdoor. It is hoped that the people won’t have to get ‘chits’ from politicians to obtain rice from co-operatives like in the bad old days.
The need that has arisen for an efficient distribution and marketing network should serve as an eye-opener to the government vis-à-vis the rapid expansion of supermarket chains at the expense of retail traders. The day may not be far off when the consumer will be at the mercy of those super markets with massive overheads to buy his provisions at exorbitant prices. The attractive prices they are offering at present are deceptive. They will lay bare their true faces only after they get rid of the retail traders and acquire monopolistic status. It behoves the government to prevent retailers from going out of business, in the public interest.
Minister of Agriculture Maithripala Sirisena is reported to have attributed the steep rise in the rice prices to a sharp increase in the demand for rice caused by a huge drop in the wheat flour consumption—40 per cent—due to the recent flour price increases. The basis of his pronouncement remains to be statistically proved but if what he says is true, then the country is on the right course. The people must be encouraged to consume less wheat flour. However, if there has been so sharp a drop in the wheat flour consumption, as he claims, then how on earth haven’t the prices of flour based products come down or any bakeries gone out of business? The prices of paan, gal banis, maalu pan and bibikkam continue to rise and bakers are having a field day! We just can’t understand Sirisena’s economics.
Minister Sirisena has offered to resign if that would help bring down rice prices. Price hikes or no price hikes, the people will really appreciate his resignation, which will be some consolation to the irate public bearing the cost of maintaining a jumbo Cabinet. It is the fervent wish of the people that one half, if not three quarters, of the Cabinet will step down. How relieving it will be for a hungry man to have a swarm of parasites feasting on him removed goes without saying!
President Rajapaksa is said to have had a discussion with rice importers and mill owners on how to arrest the increasing rice prices. It would have been more prudent for him to invite Pottu Amman to a discussion on how to defeat terrorism in this country!
The heavenward rush of the rice prices cannot be explained in the light of Sirisena’s ‘piti theory’. Rice prices are being kept artificially high through hoarding by a cartel. We have pointed out in these columns umpteen times that successive governments have placed the consumer at the mercy of a mudalali Mafia, which controls from Colombo even the price of an egg a humble hen lays in a far-flung village. If it is the interests of the consumer that the government intends to protect, then it must act independently of traders who are hell bent on exploiting the public.
There are times when a government has to shed its laissez-faire attitude toward the mudalalis and use the stick instead of the carrot in dealing with them. However, as is the way with this Universe, balance is of great import. Although state intervention is called for to regulate prices in crisis situations, the government must desist from taking the country towards a closed economy which is out of step with the modern world.
The soaring food prices are attributable mainly to the government’s inefficient handling of the essential commodities. The SLFP-led coalitions are usually characterised by the chicanery and shenanigans of conceited pundits in the garb of ministers whose approach to problem solving is replete with hubris and callousness. They remember the people only on the eve of an election. The present government is lucky that it is being challenged by a lame duck Opposition which floats like a bee and stings like a butterfly and the people are desirous of seeing an end to the scourge of terrorism, regardless of their economic woes.
Promises are of little use to a populace crushed under the heavy burden of living. The government ought to go beyond meetings and committees, do its damnedest to bring down prices of rice and other essential commodities and step up the local food production. It must pluck up the courage to deal with the politically backed rice mill owners— including the siblings of the ruling party politicians—who purchase paddy at Rs. 17.00 per kilo and sell a kilo of rice at Rs. 80-90 and drive both the farmer and the consumer to suicide.
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