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Published on April 29, 2008

Petchanet Pratruangkrai

The Nation

The government yesterday announced a new measure to buy rice directly from farmers, to ensure that they benefit from skyrocketing prices for the product.

The measure is aimed at not only maintaining the government's working rice stockpile, but also alleviating the burden of the rising cost of living on the common man by selling 5-kilogram packs of rice directly to consumers.

Commerce Minister Mingkwan Sangsuwan yesterday said some of the government's 2.1 million tonnes of rice would be released. The selling price would be at least 15-per-cent lower than the current market price of Bt160 to Bt190 per 5kg pack of white rice.

As the fears of exporters and rice millers will exert pressure on the prices, the government will purchase paddy rice directly from farmers. The government will offer farmers the market price, which will also enable it to maintain the government stockpile of 2.1 million tonnes at all times.

"The government plans to give the consumers relief from high rice prices, so we'll sell at a low price. But to ensure that the rice price will not drop and hurt farmers, we'll buy as much as the released stocks at the current market price," said Mingkwan.

The Rice Policy Committee today will propose that the Cabinet approve sales of low-priced rice in small packs directly to consumers.

The first stocks should be released within the next two weeks.

The ministry did not say how many volumes it would release but said the government would buy enough rice to replenish whatever was released from the government's security stocks.

To secure food supply for country, the government yesterday held a meeting with such agencies as Commerce and Agriculture ministries and the Thai private sector in a bid to solve the food crisis.

Mingkwan today will announce measures to secure the Kingdom's food supply.

Pramon Sutivong, chairman of both the Board of Trade of Thailand and the Thai Chamber of Commerce, said the private sector agreed with the government's plan to sell low-priced rice directly to consumers. However, the government must be careful about the timing, because the project could cause rice prices to fall, since it is the harvest season for the second crop of more than 6 million tonnes of white rice, Pramon said.