KARACHI: A 17-member delegation of Pakistani rice exports is leaving for Dammam, Saudi Arabia, on Saturday to attend a number of events, including a Biryani Festival, in a bid to boost the country’s share in the Kingdom’s rice import market, exporters told Arab News on Friday.

“Our prices are at par with India and our quality is far superior. We are going to capture the Indian market,” Ali Hussam Asghar, Senior Vice Chairman of the Rice Exporters Association of Pakistan (REAP), who is leading the delegation, told Arab News.

He said the delegation would start the trip in Dammam to meet and hold business-to-business meetings with rice importers of the eastern region. It would then travel to Riyadh to meet top Saudi buyers of Indian rice.

“Then we will move on to Jeddah for the mega Biryani festal in Park Hide Hotel where 130 top buyers including Saudis, Pakistanis, and Indians are invited,” Asghar said. “Saudis will be able to taste 15 varieties of biryani there.”

Pakistani exporters say they have been energized by the recent visit of Saudi Crown Prince Muhammad Bin Salman and their businesses have received a new lease of support from the Saudi embassy in Pakistan and Pakistan’s ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Asghar said.  

Pakistan was the major rice import market for Saudi Arabia in the nineties, and accounted for 80 percent of rice imports to the Kingdom, now down to 10 percent.

“We want to get back our share in the Saudi market which was more than 80 percent,” Safder Hussain Mehkri, REAP chairman told Arab News on the sidelines of the 22nd Biryani Festival held at the Sindh Governor House on Friday night. “We request the Saudi government to accommodate and facilitate our exporters so that we can increase our bilateral trade.”

He said REAP was working with the federal and provincial governments to increase rice exports from Pakistan to $5 billion by 2023 from $2 billion currently.

Pakistani rice exporters also called on the Pakistani government to work to increase their market share of rice imports in Malaysia, whose Prime Minister, Mahathir Mohammad is visiting Pakistan as the chief guest of the March 23 military parade.

“Malaysian PM is visiting Pakistan so they can be asked to increase the share of imports of Pakistani rice,” Abdul Rasheed Jan Muhammad, a leading exporter and convener of REAP’s Biryani Festival, said. “The governor Sindh can play a vital role in this regard.”