He pointed out that, presently 180 paddy purchasing centers have been established throughout the country and paddy is being received at 77 warehouses.

The government has allocated 6000 million rupees to purchase paddy this Yala Season. The Treasury has already released the total amount to People's Bank and Bank of Ceylon and the government is planning to procure about 120,000 tons of paddy from farmers during the ‘yala’ season.

District warehouses have now been arranged for paddy purchasing activities and a kilogramme of Samba is being purchased at Rs. 50 while a kilogramme of Nadu rice is being purchased at Rs. 45 at the government Stores.

Paddy is now being purchased on a large scale in the Ampara, Polonnaruwa and Anuradhapura Districts and the PMB has so far purchased 375,400 kg in Ampara, 6,000 kg in Kilinochchi, 3,900 kg in Kurunegala, 45,400 kg in Moneragala, 1,500 kg in Mullaitivu, 23,786 kg in Ratnapura and 24,500 kg in Vavuniya, directly from farmers.