Bumper crops raise rice export target

HA NOI — Rice exporters in Viet Nam have signed contracts until September to bring total rice exports to 3.5 million tonnes, according to the Viet Nam Food Association (VFA).
Viet Nam exported 3.38 million tonnes of rice in the first eight months of the year, earning over US$2.2 billion, the General Statistics Office reported.
With bumper crops in both the northern and southern granaries, the country expected to reap a total of 37 million tonnes of rice this year, one million tonnes more than in 2007, said the VFA.
To create more favourable conditions for enterprises purchasing rice for export, the Government had permitted a delayed collection of taxes for rice exports with prices below $800 per tonne, the Ministry of Finance said.
Nguyen Thanh Bien, Deputy Minister of industry and trade, said that the association and rice exporters who had signed contracts on exporting rice should boost deliveries of exports of 100,000-200,000 tonnes in September.
To complete the Government’s plan to export a total of 4.5-4.6 million tonnes this year, the Ministry of Industry and Trade has also asked the association and its members to enhance the signing of rice-export contracts.
Experts have forecast that the world rice market would become more stable in the year-end months, following strong fluctuations during the first half, as major rice producers have started to harvest crops with yields higher than last year, and importers have nearly fulfilled their yearly import targets.
Rice prices on the world market have reduced by between 35 and 42 per cent from record highs in late May. Viet Nam’s 5 per cent broken rice slipped to $600 per tonne from its previous $1,050 per tonne.
However, the pundits have said that the downward trend would stop by the year-end and rice prices would rebound due to lower stockpiles compared with previous years and the recent global food crisis.
Shrinking cultivation areas and higher production costs were also factors that pushed up rice prices across the world, they said, pointing to the fact that the current prices were almost double the $320-340 per tonne figures from just one year ago.
Rice reserves
The Southern Food Corporation has purchased 660,000 tonnes of rice for temporary reserves with loans of VND1.5 trillion from the Bank for Investment and Development of Viet Nam (BIDV) under the Government’s instructions.
Pham Kim Yen, deputy chairwoman of the People’s Committee of An Giang, said the association had required foodstuff trading companies in the province to buy 60,000 tonnes of rice for temporary reserves.
Then, the province had asked the association to increase its purchasing-reserve quota by 90,000 tonnes, she said. Finally, the province would need to buy 150,000 tonnes of rice for temporary reserves.
However, Nguyen Thanh Binh, director of the An Giang Industry and Trade Department, said that the quota was lower than the province’s rice output. So the province would require the association to increase the quota to VND300,000-400,000 tonnes.
The association had given Dong Thap Province a quota to buy 100,000 tonnes for temporary reserves this month, said Truong Ngoc Han, chairman of the Dong Thap People’s Committee.
Dong Thap authorities would ask rice trading companies in the province to purchase 200,000 tonnes per month in September and October, he said.
So far, the volume of rice purchased from farmers has increased to 20,000 tonnes per day, with an average price of VND5,000 per kg.
August purchases by VFA businesses were expected to reach 640,000 tonnes, or 730,000 tonnes including private businesses, the association said. — VNS