Many "big guys" withdraw plans to import Vietnamese rice

Many major markets for Vietnamese rice such as Indonesia, the Philippines... have withdrawn their rice import plans, causing Vietnamese rice to miss out on many large contracts.

Political factors in the first months of 2016 are strongly affecting rice import and export activities. Specifically, the Indonesian National Logistics Agency (Bulog) has just announced that it will stop buying rice from four suppliers that have a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the government of this country, namely Thailand, Pakistan, Cambodia and Vietnam, according to the rice purchasing plan in February.

The reason is because the Minister of Agriculture of this country believes that Indonesia has enough rice and does not need to import. He also believes that the recent fluctuations in the domestic rice market in Indonesia are due to the impact of hoarding and speculation, and this situation will be eliminated.

Vietnam's rice exports face difficulties as major markets withdraw import plans.

Meanwhile, the Vietnam Food Association (VFA) said that due to political issues, Indonesia will not import rice until domestic market prices spike due to a lack of supply. It is forecasted that after Indonesia assesses its post-harvest output in June, the country's import demand situation will become clearer.

Along with Indonesia, the Philippines’ National Food Authority (NFA) has also withdrawn its plan to import 400,000 tons of rice announced at the beginning of the year. The country is also waiting to see how its inventories develop and considering allowing private imports of 1 million tons under the WTO Minimum Access Volume (MAV), 500,000 tons allocated to specific countries and 500,000 tons from other suppliers.

According to VFA's assessment, the Philippines' rice imports are also affected by political factors. Some opinions say that allowing imports under the WTO mechanism has led to widespread smuggling, harming domestic production and seriously affecting the country's food self-sufficiency policy.

The withdrawal of import plans by two major traditional markets, Indonesia and the Philippines, also caused Vietnam to miss a beat in rice exports in the first quarter of the year. However, VFA said that Vietnam was not much affected by this event. On the contrary, rice prices continued to increase due to the need to implement signed contracts and strong demand from China, combined with pressure to reduce output due to the impact of drought and saltwater intrusion in coastal provinces./.

According to VOV.VN