Colombia’s agriculture minister, Indalecio Dangond, told farmers in La Guajira on 4 October to stop growing rice. He called the crop “not a business” at a meeting in Urumita. Dangond urged a switch to cashew, coconut, palm oil, pomegranate and plantain instead. The remarks triggered an immediate backlash from rice growers, lawmakers and former president Gustavo Petro.
Dangond argued that rice carries a heavy cost. Its six-month replanting cycle and high water needs make it a poor bet next to permanent crops, he said. Costs in La Guajira were running above 10 million pesos (roughly $3,090, or £2,340) a hectare. Yields below 8-9 tonnes per hectare could not justify that spending, he argued. Cashew, by contrast, now returns more than 34% profitability in the same region. He said permanent tree crops carry less exposure to the water scarcity that El Niño years bring to La Guajira’s dry plains. Coconut, palm oil and pomegranate, he added, share that same lower water demand once established, even if they take longer than rice to reach their first harvest.
Growers push back
Fedearroz, the national rice growers’ federation, said it felt “profound concern and solidarity” with producers already struggling. In Huila, paddy rice fetched about 193,200 pesos ($60, or £45) per carga in late September. The break-even point sits near 208,000 pesos ($64, or £49). Growers there say six in ten of their peers have farmed at a loss for two years running. A carga, the standard Colombian measure for rough rice, weighs 125 kilograms, meaning the gap between market price and break-even translates into a real loss on every sale.
Dangond later clarified his advice. He said it was meant only for Fonseca, a rice-growing pocket of La Guajira, not the whole country. Senate vice-president Alejandro Ocampo and conservative senator Julio Roberto Salazar both criticised the comments as reckless. Growers in Tolima, where some 2,500 farmers cultivate about 47,000 hectares a semester, said the minister had ignored rice’s wider economic footprint.
National figures show the strain predating the row. Planted area fell from 631,071 hectares in 2024 to 563,970 in 2025. It dropped a further 22.3% in the first half of 2026 against the same period last year. Average Colombian rice consumption stands at 41.52kg a person annually, underlining how central the grain remains to the national diet even as cultivated area shrinks.
A dispute the ministry has not resolved
Fedearroz also pointed to friction with the ministry over the parafiscal fund that growers pay into for research and market support. It said government audits already cover its books. That dispute adds a second front to the row, beyond the minister’s crop-switching advice itself.
The federation attributes the sector’s contraction to a mix of import competition, climate volatility and rising financing costs. Growers in Huila and Tolima argue that abandoning rice wholesale would strip those departments of a crop that still anchors local labour markets, whatever its thin margins. Milling, transport and seasonal harvest labour all depend on a steady planted area, they say. Cashew or palm plantations would take years to replicate those income streams at the same scale, growers argue, leaving a gap no quick crop switch can fill.
Colombia’s experience echoes a wider rethink of rice economics playing out elsewhere this week. Indonesia’s statisticians report a forecast drop in rice output, even as farmer earnings improve. Both cases share the same underlying arithmetic: a thirsty staple crop struggles when input costs rise faster than farmgate prices.
For now, Dangond has not withdrawn his core message. He maintains that permanent crops offer steadier returns than rice in water-stressed, high-cost growing zones. Whether that view hardens into policy, or recedes after the backlash, will shape planting decisions in La Guajira before the next rice cycle begins.
