KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 1 — The trend of panic buying has almost diminished and local supply of white rice in the market is back to stable condition this week, said Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food Security Chan Foong Hin.

He said the positive situation was due to the lack of panic buying by consumers and traders, compared to last week.

"I found that at the Federal Agricultural Marketing Authority (Fama) operations centre, it has distributed as much as 400 metric tonnes (MT) of local white rice per month and an additional 1,100 (MT) for distribution through all Fama networks to cater for public’s need,” he said.

Chan said this after officiating at the 2023 World Rabies Day celebration here today.

When asked about the possibility of an ‘unseen hand’ taking advantage of the local white rice shortage, he reiterated that the issue should not be politicized and said that hundreds of operations carried out by the Ministry of Domestic Trade and Cost of Living (KPDN) revealed that there are no wrongdoings or irregularities of such nature.

"We should devote our energy to more specific issues such as logistics, distribution and local rice stocks that are more efficient and effective,” he said. — Bernama