The rice barter agreement with Venezuela will commence for 2015 with a drop in prices by US$20 per tonne and a new mechanism is in place for the allocation of quotas to millers.
In 2014 Guyana shipped rice to Venezuela under the PetroCaribe agreement for roughly US780 per tonne, this year the cost, insurance and freight figure will be US$760 per tonne. The price for paddy remains at US$480 per tonne. Under the rice agreement 120,000 tonnes of paddy and 74,000 tonnes of white rice will be shipped to Venezuela.
The drop in price has some critics stating that the rice quality may be at fault, while others within the industry have said that the