|
Thailand, the world's biggest rice exporter, backed off its unpopular "OPEC-style" rice cartel proposal on Tuesday and offered to host a forum of top producing nations to boost supplies and yields.
"If Thailand was going to set up a rice cartel to fix the price, that would worsen food security," Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama told reporters after a lunch with diplomats from six rice-producing countries.
Noppadon said he floated an idea of establishing an international agency to share information on rice production and productivity, called the "Council on Rice Trade Cooperation" instead of a price-setting body.
Noppadon said Thailand, whose rice exports account for a third of the world's total, would host the first meeting in two to three months if the six countries -- China, India, Pakistan, Cambodia, Myanmar and Vietnam -- agreed.
Thai Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej told visiting Myanmar Prime Minister Thein Sein last week he would like to revive the long-dormant idea of a price-setting body, involving Thailand, Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia.
But economic analysts and traders said the proposal would go nowhere because of the inability of governments to cooperate with each other and control farmers' output.
Samak said Thein Sein had agreed in principle to the idea, but the Burmese general did not speak to reporters. Myanmar has resumed limited rice exports this year, mainly to South Asia, after several years off the market, trade sources say.
The five Southeast Asian nations produce a combined 60 million tonnes of milled rice each year, about 14 percent of world output. But only Thailand, the world's No. 1 rice exporter, and Vietnam have major surpluses.
Noppadon said the new rice body would not duplicate work of the 48-year-old, Philippine-based International Rice Research Institute, Asia's biggest non-profit rice research and education organisation with staff based in 14 Asian and African countries.
 |
Show/Hide comments
Show/Hide comment form
