By PETCHANET PRATRUANGKRAI
THE NATION
To achieve its goal of making Thailand a rice-trading centre, the Commerce Ministry has drawn up a plan to cooperate with Burma and Cambodia, as both countries have high competency as supply sources to Thailand.
Meanwhile, the Thai government will directly purchase 2 million tonnes of paddy rice from farmers on March 16 as part of its strategy to shore up rice prices.
A senior source from the ministry said Thailand would tighten cooperation on rice trading with Burma and Cambodia by help them export rice overseas. However, the country will not import their rice to the Kingdom, but will set up polishing plants in border provinces, as Thailand has high expertise in rice polishing.
"Many Vietnamese and other foreign rice traders have tried to purchase rice from Burma and Cambodia, as it is good-quality but low-priced. Thailand will help both nations develop their rice polishing and exports to emphasise Thailand as a centre of rice trading," said the source.
The Cambodian government has called for Thailand's cooperation to halt decreases in its rice price after traders from Vietnam purchased rice from that country at very low prices. Cooperation with Thailand should increase the bargaining power for Cambodian farmers and traders, the source said.
Chookiat Ophaswongse, honourable president of the Thai Rice Exporters Association, has supported the government's plan to tighten cooperation with Burma and Cambodia. However, the government must ensure that it will prevent Thai rice seeds getting mixed up with other seeds, as that would destroy the reputation of Thai rice as having the best quality.
In addition, he said the government should concentrate on development of the quality of Thai rice and on reducing production costs rather than increasing its price guarantee.
Chookiat said the rice price had dropped slightly because of increased supply from Vietnam. Thai rice farmers will only enjoy a short-term benefit from increasing the guaranteed price of rice. The government should seek ways to help farmers reduce their costs of production and increase yield per rai in the long run.
The association reported the export price for 5-per-cent Thai white rice had dropped slightly from US$520-$530 a tonne last week to $510 (Bt15,490) a tonne this week.
6 comments:
Why does Thailand has to be the center of everything? Cambodia must their own rice distribution center too! This is what I don't understand why does Cambodia has to go through Thailand or Vietname just to export their rice?
Cambodia should advertise more about their products and services to the world!
Yes I support the idea of being our own but one main worry is I am afraid of middlemen take advantage from farmer when there is no competitor from outside. I observed many occasion, when there are no outside buyer, the Cambodian companies or middlemen drop paddy price sharply which make our farmers face hard situation and sell in cheap price.
The Cambodian businessmen should do business with ethic where benefit to both their business and farmers and finally will benefit to nation economic
To 3:39PM
Well...If that is the case then the Cambodian government must provide all available information to Cambodian farmers so they can bypass the middleman.
for years, siem always buy rice in bulks from both cambodia and burma or myanmar as it is known today. it's about time cambodia labels and start exporting our own rice from our country without selling them to siem or thailand! wake up, cambodia!
i know, siem thugs are so greedy! they even want all the airplanes to land in bangcock before coming to cambodia, etc! i say it's about time cambodia stop depending so much on siem for flights, etc! let's get a bigger airports for our country so tourists don't have to make stopover in bangcock and wasted their money there. come to cambodia instead. god bless cambodia.
siem took advantage of cambodis for too long already, it's time to say no more to them, really!
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