Ministry seeks ways to cut rice stockpiles
The Commerce Ministry was able to sell only 30,000 tonnes of rice to two traders at this year's third auction, so it may look for a new strategy to reduce its stockpiles to earn more returns for the Finance Ministry this year.
Pranee Siriphand, director-general of the Foreign Trade Department, said that bidding for 201,000 tonnes of rice opened on Monday but only 30,000 tonnes of 5-per-cent white rice was sold to two exporters, Asia Golden Rice and Chaiyaporn.
The department did not disclose the agreed price, but said it was satisfactory to both the government and the buyers. Other lots of rice could not been sold because the bids were much lower than the market price.
Because of the small number of bidders, Pranee said the department tomorrow would propose some adjustments to the subcommittee overseeing the release of rice from ministry stockpiles.
The ministry needs to find some new methods to ensure that the government will earn more money to pay back to the Finance Ministry, which is funding the pledging programme, this year, she said. The government has been able to generate about Bt100 million from two rice auctions this year. The Commerce Ministry was able to pay Bt3.8 billion to the Finance Ministry this month. To date, it has returned about Bt150 billion.
A senior Commerce Ministry official said it should be able to pay a total of Bt200 billion to Finance this year. This includes a payment from Iran, which purchased 250,000 tonnes of rice under a government-to-government contract. Moreover, Indonesia is expected to purchase not less than 300,000 tonnes of rice under a G2G contract soon.
About 15 million tonnes of rice remain in the government’s stockpiles.
Meanwhile, the Commerce Ministry plans to allocate 200,000 tonnes of white rice for small packs sold directly to consumers to help relieve the cost of living.
The plan will be proposed tomorrow to the government’s subcommittee overseeing the release of rice stocks.
Deputy Commerce Minister Natthawut Saikuar said the rice should be sold at Bt85-Bt89 per 5-kilogram pack.
The ministry will closely monitor goods prices and will not allow increases without good reason.
