Powdered rice growth ‘stagnant’… Productivity and price homework

The article highlights a decrease in the production and consumption of powdered rice in South Korea, leading to a reduction in the government's production target and a revision of the powdered rice promotion policy. The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs had set a goal to cultivate 15,800 hectares and produce 75,000 tons of powdered rice by 2025, with plans to replace 10% of the country's annual wheat flour demand by 2027. However, the actual cultivation area was only 8,400 hectares last year due to damage and poor seed acquisition, coupled with stagnant demand. Criticism includes the lack of focus on industry promotion and improvement of cultivation techniques, calls for increasing production capacity, lowering prices, and diversifying varieties. The Ministry is planning to develop a new variety, improve the cultivation manual, and distribute technology through the 'Korean Powdered Rice Community Management Association.' The expansion of the powdered rice production area has reached a plateau, with this year's target being 39.9% lower than planned.

The production and consumption of powdered rice (powdered rice), which had been growing, were found to have slowed down last year. Accordingly, the government set this year’s production target lower than the original plan and began to adjust the pace of the powdered rice promotion policy. The Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs established the ‘Measures to Activate the Rice Processing Industry Using Powdered Rice’ in 2022 and is actively supporting powdered rice production. The idea is to strengthen food security by using powdered rice, which is easier to mill than regular rice, instead of imported wheat flour and reduce regular rice production to stabilize rice supply and demand. To this end, the goal was to achieve a powdered rice cultivation area of 15,800 ha and a production volume of 75,000 tons by 2025. The goal was to produce 200,000 tons of powdered rice by 2027 to replace 10% of Korea’s annual wheat flour demand (2 million tons). However, the powdered ...