HANOI: Vietnamese rice export prices rose this week on fresh orders from the Philippines and China, while the onset of winter and sparse rainfall raised concerns over supply, which, when coupled with a stronger baht, propelled Thai rates higher.
Vietnam's 5% broken rice prices rose to $495-$500 per tonne from $493-$497 last week.
"Buyers from the Philippines and China have returned to place new orders," a trader based in Ho Chi Minh City said.
Domestic supplies are low and the ongoing autumn-winter harvest will end this month, the trader added. Government data showed Vietnam's rice exports in October fell 5.8% from September to 362,930 tonnes. For the first 10 months of this year, total shipments fell 2.8% from a year earlier to 5.35 million tonnes.
Thailand's benchmark 5% broken rice prices jumped to $470-$485 from $455-$458 a week earlier. The baht scaled a 10 month-peak on Wednesday, translating into higher export prices in US dollars.
Thailand officially entered the winter season in late October, with rainfall becoming more sparse, prompting worries that the volume of new crops being harvested at present would be lower, traders said.
Prices of top exporter India's 5 percent broken parboiled variety were unchanged at $366-$370 per tonne, the lowest since end-March.
"New season supplies are rising in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and West Bengal. Export demand is a bit weak now," said an exporter based at Kakinada in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.
Meanwhile, a food ministry official in neighboring Bangladesh said the country could import a small amount of rice amid a potential production shortfall and a spike in domestic prices of the staple.
A recent domestic rice procurement drive by the government fell nearly 1 million tonnes short of the 1.95 million tonnes target, as Bangladesh struggled with dwindling supplies amid soaring domestic prices and the COVID-19 pandemic.
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