(Business in Cameroon) - During a consultation meeting organised on 13 January 2016 in Yaoundé, the Cameroonian capital, the Minister of Trade and operators of the rice sector agreed not to pass on the rice import tax reinstated in Cameroon, on the final selling price of this foodstuff in the Cameroonian market.

An agreement which reassures consumers, who feared an increase in the price per kilogram of rice on the local market, from the moment the 2016 Finance bill comes into effect, in which the 5% tax on imported rice is reinstated, 8 years after its removal following the riots of end February 2008.

Rice is one of the food staples in Cameroon. But the country barely produces 100,000 tons, for a national demand of sometimes 300,000 tons per year. The gap is therefore filled in by massive imports, which officially cost about a hundred billion of FCfa per year.