Vietnam first half rice sales to fall 21 percent

Vietnam's first half rice exports are likely to fall 21 percent on the year due to a shortage of shipping, lifting the country's stockpile to record levels, a senior industry official said on Wednesday.
"The lower volume came mainly because there were not enough vessels due to higher freight," Nguyen Thai Nugget, general secretary of the Vietnam Food Association, said. "The contracts we signed are similar in quantity to last year's period but we have a record stockpile this year due to slow loading."
Rice exports in the first five months reached 1.8 million tonnes and exporters would load 400,000 tonnes to 450,000 tonnes more this month, bringing the first half shipment to 2.25 million tonnes, Nugget said.
She did not give the stockpile size. Vietnam, the world's second largest rice exporter, shipped 2.84 million tonnes of rice during the first six months of last year.
Nugget was recently quoted in state media saying that freight to Africa had jumped to $120 a tonne from $80-$90 two months previously, while freight to other Asian countries nearly doubled over the same period to $30 a tonne. The association's January-May export numbers are less than government data that showed 1.95 million tonnes shipped for the first five months.
The government has a rice export target of 4-4.5 million tonnes this year, cut from 4.75 million tonnes sold in 2006 after pests damaged part of last year's crop. In the past it has revised up the annual export target during the third quarter. On Wednesday state-run media quoted a Trade Ministry official, as saying exporters should discontinue signing new contracts because Vietnam has so far signed contracts to export a total of 3.5 million tonnes, near the annual target.
But in April the chairman of the food association, Truing Thank Phong, had said a bumper crop and good overseas demand could help Vietnam export up to 5 million tonnes. Nugget said the food association did not intend to slow the pace of contract signing to ensure the government target is met.
"The winter-spring paddy stock is good, and our policy was to strive to buy all of the farmers' grain from the winter-spring and the summer-autumn crops for exports," Nugget said.