Dhaka [Bangladesh], March 15 : The MV Mariam ship carrying 26,250 tons of Atap rice from Pakistan has arrived at Chittagong port, Bangladesh Food Ministry said in a statement on Saturday.
The Daily Star reported that this is the last phase of 50,000 tonnes of rice purchased from Pakistan under a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed between the Directorate of Food, Bangladesh, and the Trading Corporation of Pakistan on January 31.
MV Mariam arrived at the outer anchorage of Chittagong port on March 11 while it berthed at a port jetty on Friday, the report said.
It said that after the quality test of the sample collected from the ship, rice unloading started on Friday evening.
Bangladesh received 26,250 tonnes of atap rice as the first shipment of the Government-to-Government (G-to-G) deal on March 5, the report said.
The Daily Star reported on March 6 that the Directorate of Food, Bangladesh, and the Trading Corporation of Pakistan signed the deal in January this year, said Gnana Priya Bidurshi Chakma, controller of movement and storage at the Chattogram food office.
According to the Dhaka Tribune, the MoU under which the rice was purchased was signed between the Directorate General of Food and the Trading Corporation of Pakistan.
On March 5, Dhaka Tribune cited Mohiuddin Ahmed Chowdhury, food inspector at the Chittagong Movement and Storage Regulatory Office, who said: "Around 3,000 metric tons of rice can be unloaded from a ship daily. Based on this rate, it may take about eight days to unload the 26,250 metric tons of rice from the Pakistani vessel. Last month, a total of 93,783 metric tons of rice was unloaded at Chittagong Port, which was imported from India and Myanmar."
This is the first ever purchase of rice under a G-to-G deal since Bangladesh's Liberation War against Pakistan in 1971, the Daily Star reported.