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The government plans to increase Bangladesh's public food storage capacity to 3.4 million tonnes over the next five years, while maintaining what officials describe as a comfortable level of food grain reserves to strengthen national food security.
According to the Ministry of Food, as of July 23, government warehouses held a total of 2.374 million tonnes of food grains, including rice, wheat, paddy and floating stocks. The reserve includes 1.961 million tonnes of rice, 295,689 tonnes of wheat, 168,605 tonnes of paddy, and 8,735 tonnes of floating rice stock.
Officials said the country's conventional minimum food security reserve is 1.35 million tonnes, although the government has decided to raise that benchmark to 1.6 million tonnes in view of population growth and the expansion of social safety net programmes.
Data from the Directorate General of Food show that by July 23 of the 2025–26 fiscal year, the government had procured 1.365 million tonnes of paddy and rice under its domestic Boro procurement programme. The total includes 459,498 tonnes of paddy, 989,420 tonnes of parboiled rice, and 76,814 tonnes of non-parboiled rice.
The ministry said food grain imports and procurement are being closely monitored to ensure adequate market supply, maintain price stability and support uninterrupted government food distribution programmes.
Mohammad Kamrul Islam Chowdhury, Joint Secretary of the Food Ministry's Procurement Wing, said the ongoing procurement campaign had progressed satisfactorily with strong cooperation from farmers and rice mill owners.
Firoz Al Mahmud, Research Director of the Food Planning and Monitoring Unit (FPMU), said the government is expanding food reserves and storage facilities to meet growing national demand.
Additional Director General of the Directorate General of Food Md Jamal Hossain said the country's public food storage capacity has already increased from around 2.4 million tonnes to 2.7 million tonnes, with a target of reaching 3.4 million tonnes within the next five years.
