|
Rice exports go against grain
Rice exports totalled 3.8 million tonnes and earned US$1.8 billion during the first half of this year, a year-on-year increase of 25 per cent that buck the prevailing decline in exports of other agricultural products.
The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has also reported that rice exporters have signed contracts to export an additional 800,000 tonnes in June, bringing the total volume for the year to-date to 5 million tonnes, meeting the ministry’s target for the period of 4.5-5 million tonnes.
The Philippines remained the largest importer of Vietnamese rice, gobbling up 50 per cent of the country’s total export volume at a cost of over $752 million. Malaysia was a distant second, accounting for 8.7 per cent of total exports at a cost of $129 million.
The Philippines has announced it would buy an additional 700,000 tonnes from Viet Nam starting in July, while Malaysia also planned to buy an additional 150,000 tonnes.
While domestic retail prices have inched up in the past ten days – rising by VND200/kg in the Cuu Long (Mekong) Delta city of Can Tho – Food and Agriculture Organisation representative Andrew Speedy was predicting that rice exports would become increasingly unprofitable in the second half of the year, as new contracts are negotiated.
Speedy noted that rival regional rice exporters like India, Cambodia, and Thailand were all forecast to have bumper crops this year, creating much larger reserves and contributing to a decline in prices by year’s end.
Meanwhile, the Government recently scrapped provincial export quotas to free up the market, and Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung called on provincial People’s Committees to co-operate with the Ministry of Industry and Trade and the Viet Nam Food Association to help enterprises boost rice sales.
Industry experts were predicting that total exports for the year would easily surpass the record of 6 million tonnes, but prices were unpredictable. Deputy Minister of Industry and Trade Nguyen Thanh Bien agreed, saying supply and demand remained in flux and long-term price predictions were difficult.
vietnamnews
|
