Although rice exporters complain vociferously that pledging has damaged trading competitiveness, the government will prolong the policy next year to drive the price of white rice up to the target of US$800 per tonne.
Yanyong Phuangrach, permanent secretary of the Commerce Ministry, yesterday said the government would focus on continuing the measure as a method of promoting better incomes for farmers.
Despite the large volume of stockpiled rice, which could adversely affect exporters, the government will also consider a plan to promote trading with a limited impact on rice prices, he said.
The ministry announced that it would continue to release stockpiled rice to traders in the market. It will focus on releasing the commodity in small lots so as to avoid a negative effect on domestic prices at a time of higher demand from exporters, he added.
Yanyong declined, however, to give the exact volume of rice in the government's stockpiles.
The authorities will also emphasise government-to-government rice deals with partner countries in a further attempt to minimise the impact on domestic prices.
The government aims to get the price of white rice up close to its target of $800 a tonne, and to $1,200 for jasmine rice.
Yanyong said pledging in the 2011-12 main-crop harvest season and the second-crop harvest season this year had raised rice prices by about $50-$150 per tonne over the past year.
Currently, the price of new-crop jasmine rice is quoted at $1,073 per tonne, while the price of 100-per-cent white rice is quoted at $616.
The price of 5-per-cent white |rice is $606 per tonne, while the Vietnamese equivalent currently comes in at $420, and Indian rice |at $415.
According to the Thai Rice Exporters Association, exports have dropped continuously since late last year after the start of the pledging measure.
As of May 28, export shipments this year had dropped to 2.86 million tonnes, down 43.1 per cent from 5.03 million tonnes during the same period last year.
Exports in May alone fell to 610,157 tonnes, a year-on-year decline of 42.5 per cent from 1.06 million tonnes.
Meanwhile, after a recent meeting with Ivory Coast Trade Minister Dagabert Banzio, Commerce Minister Boonsong Teriyaphirom said Thailand had agreed to sell 200,000 tonnes of rice to the West African country this year under a government-to-government contract.
Ivory Coast needs to import about 930,000 tonnes of rice each year. Last year, more than 60 per cent of these imports were supplied by Thailand, mostly in the form of jasmine rice.
1 comment:
Thanks, to sharing rice information and rice rates in the market. Day by day rice price has increased. every year rice complaint by government. The government most need to solve the farmers problem, like available water, farming machinery, satisfy market rate, and so on. Today Many farmers are hard working in land but production of rice is not increased. So I think, government can provide free machinery, anti-insects to farmers.
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