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New rice export rules may lift local price
The Ministry of Industry and Trade, along with the Viet Nam Food Association and other enterprises, has compiled a draft regulation on rice export management to raise export prices of Vietnamese rice and enhance the effectiveness of rice export activities.
According to the draft, rice exports would be managed by granting licences, and connecting rice exporters’ interests with the obligations of buying rice from farmers and stabilising the domestic market in the co-ordination of the Viet Nam Food Association.
The ministry would appraise and grant rice export licences, and also extend them, it said.
The draft would also stipulate conditions on trading export rice, including those that enterprises must have workshops for husking and rubbing rice and warehouses to keep the grains.
The new draft management was expected to hike prices for both the domestic and export markets for Vietnamese rice, while improving the effectiveness of rice export activities.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development’s Information Centre of Agriculture and Rural Development, the average export price of Vietnamese rice had declined from US$413 per tonne of 5-per cent broken rice and $355 per tonne of 25 per cent broken rice in June and July to $392.94 and $340.39 in August. Meanwhile, those prices were $524.56 per tonne and $432.06 per tonne for Thai 5-per cent and 25-per cent broken rice.
The quality of Vietnamese export rice hads improved remarkably compared to the same period last year.
The low prices were partly due to the fact that some rice exporters had offered export prices for their rice lower than the average export price for Vietnamese rice.
They had done this to compete with other exporters, but also because they did not have warehouses to store the rice while they waited for the price to rise again.
Besides this, there were many problems with fluctuating rice prices and inadequate supplies. So when the world demand increased, Viet Nam did not have enough rice to export.
Le Van Banh, head of the Cuu Long Delta Rice Institute, said that the quality of Vietnamese unhusked rice was not lower than that of Thai unhusked rice, but the quality of Vietnamese husked rice was often lower than Thai husked rice due to poor maintenance.
Thailand had stability in the rice export market and a good trademark for its rice. Viet Nam did not have those things, Banh said
Vietnamese rice traders should co-operate to ensure rice purchases from farmers and to have stable purchasing prices, he said.
Relevant offices and enterprises should create a trademark for Viet Nam’s export rice and build warehouses , he said. Banh added that the stores would help traders keep their rice while they waited for increases in export prices on the world market.
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