High flood waters in Vietnam's Mekong Delta this year have delayed planting of the winter-spring rice crop, the country's most important, pushing the start of its harvest to early April instead of March, traders said on Wednesday.
The late arrival of Vietnam's major rice crop could affect the country's key buyers such as the Philippines and Indonesia, which are expected to return to Vietnam to import rice for their 2012 needs, coming at a time when Thai rice prices are being pushed up by a government intervention scheme.
"Waters are still high in some areas near Cambodia and elsewhere, so planting the next crop is being delayed and the harvest would be late by between 20 days and a month," a rice exporter based in the Mekong Delta province of Dong Thap said. Harvesting of the winter-spring crop, the highest yielding crop mostly used for export in the world's second-biggest exporter of the grain after Thailand, often begins in late February, peaks in March and ends in April in the Mekong Delta.
"The winter-spring crop could be delayed by a month and we now expect fresh grain to arrive in early April," said a Ho Chi Minh City-based trader who works for a foreign trading firm that buys Vietnamese rice. Another trader said floods have delayed planting in key growing provinces such as An Giang and Dong Thap, bordering Cambodia.
"High flooding in the Cuu Long Delta rose to a level on par with the record high floods in 2000 making long inundation to many areas for agricultural production," the government said in a statement on November 7. "Cuu Long Delta", or 'Nine Dragon Delta', is the Vietnamese name for the Mekong Delta, the downstream area of Mekong river where it splits into nine branches before flowing into the sea.
The Mekong Delta accounts for 90 percent of Vietnam's rice export. An abundance of water has helped create extra revenues for Mekong Delta farmers as the flows brought in from Cambodia more fish and various types of floating vegetables. Waters also delivered fertile soil that will help boost output of the next crop.
But a late arrival of fresh rice could keep Vietnamese prices high and uncompetitive while India, which has returned to the market this year, has been offering rice at $100 a tonne lower than Vietnamese or Thai grain, traders said. The availability of relatively cheaper Indian rice continued to depress demand for grain this week from Thailand and Vietnam, the world's top two exporters.