Pakistan awaits Bangladesh response to rice offer

DHAKA, May 29 (Reuters) Pakistan today said it was waiting for a response to its offer to sell 500,000 tonnes of rice to Bangladesh in a state-to-state deal, a Pakistani official said today.

''We are waiting for Bangladesh's response as we offered to sell half a million tonnes of rice to them,'' Roubina Taufiq Shah, commercial secretary of the Pakistani High Commission, told Reuters.

Pakistan made the offer when Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia visited Islamabad in February this year, a food ministry official said, adding that no decision has been taken yet.

''Bangladesh government informed us that they were making assessment of their requirements,'' Roubina said.

The food ministry launched a drive in April to procure 1.2 million tonnes of rice from the domestic market to build a food stockpike for emergencies and so far collected 172,000 tonnes, the ministry officials said.

The drive will continue till end of August, 2006, they said.

Bangladesh, where rice is the main staple food for a population of 140 million, produced 25.3 million tonnes of rice in 2004-05 fiscal year to last June, officials said.

REUTERS AD BD1410