Merchants Accused of Selling Stockpiled Rice to China

27 September 2012

Mandalay rice merchants have been buying stockpiled rice distributed to offset this year’s poor harvest and selling it to China, according to a report by The Voice Weekly on Monday. The spokesperson of the Myanmar Rice Federation (MRF), Dr Soe Tun, told the journal that the MRF has been selling 10,000 bags of rice reserves a day to wholesale markets in Rangoon to fight rising prices caused by the flooding of 600,000 acres of paddy, but merchants from Mandalay have been buying the rice for sale to China. Mandalay’s Rice Industry Association has denied involvement in the alleged scheme.