The Agricultural Administration will begin purchasing and inspecting this year's public stockpile rice from the 23rd.
(Seoul = Yonhap News) Reporter Hong Guk-ki = It was found that about 1 ton of government-managed grains supplied to vulnerable groups this year were of poor quality.
According to data received from the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs by Moon Dae-rim, a member of the National Assembly's Agriculture, Food, Rural Affairs, Oceans and Fisheries Committee on the 20th, the number of government grain quality accidents officially recognized by the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs this year was five and two in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province, respectively, with a total volume of 1.09 tons.
Among these, three cases were found to be damage to the packaging materials by rats, and the rest were found to be problems with poor sealing of the packaging materials.
In response to this, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs explained in a press release that day, "Government-managed grains for welfare purposes are supplied at a discount to stabilize the livelihoods of vulnerable groups, and the scale is approximately 170,000 tons per year as of last year," adding, "It is a 'high' grade new grain harvested that year, and is inspected by the National Agricultural Products Quality Management Service upon shipment."
Regarding the rice that was confirmed to be of poor quality, it was explained, "It was immediately replaced in the storage warehouse and finally supplied to the consumer as a normal product."
He added, "Last year, we improved the design of welfare packaging materials through a demand survey to support consumer-centered administrative services. However, there were cases of dye transfer during the rainy season and high humidity periods, so we are pushing for changes in the design of packaging materials."
Meanwhile, the Rural Development Institute will begin purchasing and inspecting public stockpile rice produced in 2026, starting with Pocheon-si, Gyeonggi-do on the 23rd.
The subject of inspection is 400,000 tons of rice, including powdered rice.
Among these, 280,000 tons of rice in bags are directly inspected by about 130 support offices and offices of the National Rural Development Administration across the country.
Testing is scheduled to be conducted at approximately 3,000 testing sites nationwide until the end of this year, depending on the amount allocated to each province.
Prior to the purchase inspection, the Rural Development Institute held a business briefing for 134 inspectors on the 30th of last month and announced that it also conducted a preliminary quality inspection for each region to increase inspection accuracy and reliability.
The remaining 120,000 tons of produced rice have been inspected by private inspectors at 365 rice processing plants (RPC) and drying and storage facilities (DSC) nationwide since the 7th of last month in accordance with the harvest season.
