MP authorizing Conab to purchase 1 million tons of imported rice loses validity

Provisional Measure 1,227/2024, which authorizes the National Supply Company (Conab) to import up to 1 million tons of processed or unhulled rice, due to the floods that affected Rio Grande do Sul in May, expired this Thursday, the 5th. The public purchase of the cereal was suggested by the government as a strategy to contain the increase in cereal prices due to the difficulties in transporting the product from Rio Grande do Sul. The forecast for importing the cereal was criticized by the production sector and opened a new dispute between agribusiness and the Executive.

Under the measure, Conab was supposed to import the cereal through public auctions at market prices within the federal government’s purchasing program to replenish public stocks. The government’s intention was to offer the cereal in metropolitan areas with food insecurity at R$20 per 5 kg package with the federal government logo and with a subsidy.

The two auction notices issued by the state-owned company, however, were contested by the production sector, which alleged state intervention. The only auction held by the company to import 263,370 tons was canceled due to irregularities in the public bidding process and alleged financial fragility of the winning companies. After the crisis broke out, the government backed down and signed an agreement with the rice sector to monitor prices and supply.

Published on May 9th of this year, the provisional measure should have been approved by the National Congress by Thursday, within the statutory deadline of 120 days. But the government itself acknowledged that it would not make an effort to approve the measure in a timely manner. “We want to use it to its fullest. By the 5th, all of its instruments will be used,” said the Minister of Agrarian Development and Family Farming, Paulo Teixeira, about the measure two weeks ago.

Conab CEO Edegar Pretto was emphatic in ruling out a new proposal for international rice purchases. “Based on all the dialogue we have been building up to now with the production sector and companies, if necessary, we are able to make arrangements with domestic production. That is our expectation. The government has no new purchase proposals on the horizon,” Pretto said on the same occasion.

The Parliamentary Front for Agriculture (FPA) also adopted the strategy of letting the measure expire.