Pakistan's Basmati exports: India captures 92 percent EU market

Pakistan is fast loosing its European Union (EU) market for basmati rice and according to figures available here on Tuesday, India has captured 92 percent of the European market for this commodity, leaving Pakistan far behind in rice exports to EU countries.
One of the main reasons is believed to poor marketing in the wake of tough competition being given by the Indian exporters. The change in consumers' preference is attributed to the aggressive marketing strategy, adopted by the Indian exporters, who outwitted their Pakistani competitors.
According to recent EU data, India exported 178,000 tonnes of basmati rice to the European Union-member countries, which increased to 226,000 tonnes in 2006-07 till June 12, 2007.
As against this, Pakistan exported just 41,478 tonnes in 2005-06 and in 2006-07, the exports further declined to 27,000 tonnes. Concerned over the surge in basmati rice imports from India, Brussels is planning to put in place a DNA testing protocol, which can allow imports of "genuine" basmati rice.
It is learnt that the EU is all set to review its import regime as Indian basmati rice has begun flooding its markets. India and Pakistan are the only two countries, which produce and export this unique long grain. Brown basmati rice enjoys a duty derogation of 60 Euro per tonne, translating into zero duty.
According to a report, Indian officials had demanded that there should be a common DNA testing protocol for both India and Pakistan. The process should be transparent and the protocol should be validated in both India and Pakistan.
India has already submitted a protocol, formulated by the Hyderabad Deccan-based centre for DNA Fingerprinting, but Brussels said that it would device its own protocol. It asked both India and Pakistan to provide relevant information.
In Britain, the UK Food Standard Authority has begun testing basmati rice at retail level with a view to checking adulteration. The global market size for basmati rice is over 1,167 million dollars and in 2005-06 over two million tonnes was exported by India and Pakistan, of which the farmer's share is 58.16 percent. India exports to about 126 countries and earns 687 million dollars.