Paddy carries a husk, a bran layer and moisture that finished rice does not, so 100 kg of paddy always gives well under 100 kg of saleable rice. The rest leaves the mill as husk and bran, sold as by-products; as broken fractions, sold separately; and as moisture, dust and impurities that never reach a bag. Milling recovery measures how much rice comes out, and head rice yield measures how much of it is whole. Together they decide what a kilogram of finished rice really costs.
Key takeaways
- Husk is roughly a fifth of paddy by weight; bran and germ make up most of the rest of what milling removes.
- Total milled rice includes brokens. Head rice yield counts only grains at least three-quarters of full length.
- Paddy moisture, immature grains, impurities, variety, parboiling and degree of polish all move recovery.
- Government custom milling uses fixed outturn norms; open-market prices follow the actual yield and specification.
In this guide
What a paddy grain is made of
Milling removes the husk to give brown rice, then removes the bran layers and the germ to give milled rice. Published descriptions put the husk at roughly 20% of paddy by weight, the bran layers at around 11% and the starchy endosperm, the part sold as rice, at around 69%. The exact split varies with the variety and with how the paddy was grown, dried and stored.
Terms buyers meet
| Term | What it measures |
|---|---|
| Milling recovery (total milled rice) | Milled rice, whole and broken, as a percentage of the paddy weight |
| Head rice yield | Head rice, grains at least three-quarters of full length, as a percentage of the paddy weight |
| Brokens | Broken grains as a share of the milled rice or of the paddy; always say which |
| By-products | Husk and bran, sold separately |
| Invisible loss | Moisture driven off, dust and impurities removed, and handling losses |
| Outturn ratio | In government custom milling, the rice a miller must deliver for each quintal of paddy |
The broken streams themselves, grader rice and khud, are explained in broken rice, khud and grader rice.
A worked mass balance
All figures in this section are hypothetical, chosen to show the arithmetic. They are not SONIK figures.
| Stream | From 1,000 kg of paddy | Share |
|---|---|---|
| Husk | 210 kg | 21.0% |
| Bran, including germ | 75 kg | 7.5% |
| Head rice | 580 kg | 58.0% |
| Broken fractions (grader rice and khud) | 90 kg | 9.0% |
| Rejection from colour sorting | 10 kg | 1.0% |
| Invisible loss (moisture, dust, impurities) | 35 kg | 3.5% |
| Total | 1,000 kg | 100.0% |
The same broken stream is 9.0% of the paddy but 13.2% of the milled rice (90 ÷ 680). That is why a broken percentage means little until you know what it is a percentage of.
Why recovery changes the cost of rice
Continue the hypothetical example. If paddy costs ₹23 a kg, the paddy in each kilogram of milled rice costs ₹23 ÷ 0.68 = ₹33.82. Counted against head rice alone, it costs ₹23 ÷ 0.58 = ₹39.66. A change of two points in recovery, either way, moves the paddy cost of every kilogram of rice by about ₹1. That is before milling costs, bags and freight, and before the income from husk, bran and broken fractions, which offsets part of it.
This is also why rice from paddy bought at the same price can be offered at different rates. A specification that allows fewer brokens, or asks for a heavier polish, leaves more of the paddy in lower-value streams.
What moves recovery
- Paddy moisture and drying: paddy milled too wet, or dried too fast or unevenly, cracks and breaks.
- Immature and damaged grains: they break in the machines or are sorted out.
- Impurities: stones, straw and empty grains add weight to the paddy but nothing to the rice.
- Variety: grain shape and hardness differ, and so does the way grains break.
- Parboiling: properly parboiled paddy breaks less in milling; poorly parboiled paddy can break more. The stages are described in how parboiled rice is processed.
- Degree of polish: heavier whitening and polishing lowers milling recovery.
- Machine settings and condition: worn or poorly adjusted machines raise brokens.
Outturn norms in government custom milling
In custom milling of paddy procured by government agencies, the miller delivers a fixed quantity of rice for each quintal of paddy received, rather than whatever the paddy actually yields. The norm used for many years has been 67 kg of raw rice or 68 kg of parboiled rice per 100 kg of paddy. The Comptroller and Auditor General cited it in a 2015 audit as the Tariff Commission’s 2005 norm, and West Bengal’s custom milling agreement for KMS 2019-20 used the same extraction ratios. Procurement policy is issued for each Kharif Marketing Season (KMS), so check the norm in force for the current season before relying on these figures.
Open-market rice is different: its price reflects the actual yield of the paddy and the specification of the finished rice, not a fixed norm.
SONIK sells the by-products and fractions described here, rice bran, rice husk, grader rice and khud / rice cuts, as well as finished rice; buying rice bran covers the most perishable of them. For a quotation, use the bulk enquiry form.
Sources
- Comptroller and Auditor General of India. Report No. 31 of 2015, performance audit of procurement and milling of paddy for the central pool, chapter 5.
- Food and Supplies Department, Government of West Bengal. Proforma of bipartite custom milling agreement, KMS 2019-20.
- Bangladesh Agricultural University. Study of husking and milling performance of rice mills, on the composition of paddy.
- Thapa, M.J. and others. Study on quality and milling recovery of different varieties of rice at varying degree of polishing under Khumaltar condition. Agronomy Society of Nepal.
- Codex Alimentarius. Standard for Rice (CXS 198-1995), definition of head rice.
