Cassava, rice mortgage schemes start
Bangkok Post, November 3, 2003
Post reporters
The Commerce Ministry is set to allocate more than five billion baht to mortgage cassava from planters to help alleviate exploitation by unscrupulous traders.
According to Commerce Minister Adisai Bodharamik, the ministry will start the cassava mortgage scheme in the middle of this month,with the mortgage price set at 1.05 baht per kilogramme for the first month.
The price would increase to 1.10 baht in December and 1.15 baht in January. Planters could mortgage their crops at participating plants that would also process
the cassava into tapioca flour to be kept at the government warehouses. They could redeem their crops any time within the three-month period in the form of flour if they saw a better price. Currently, farmers sell their output at only 90 satang a kilo, despite the country's increase in tapioca exports of more than 20% to 22.4 billion baht in the first seven months of the year.
Exports of cassava are expected to generate more than 28 billion baht, a 20% rise over last year.
In related news, the ministry on Saturday began to mortgage nine million tonnes of paddy rice for the 2003-04 fiscal year to support domestic prices.
Mr. Adisai said the annual rice mortgage programme would end on Feb 28.
Of the nine million tonnes, jasmine paddy would account for five million tonnes,
glutinous paddy one million and rice paddy three million tonnes.
Mortgage prices will be based on quality, with the price for jasmine paddy with 15% moisture set at 6,700-7,000 baht a tonne. The price had been set at 4,760-5,330 baht a tonne for rice paddy with 15% moisture, and 5,650-5,900 baht for glutinous paddy with 15% moisture.
To curb any irregularities, the ministry will set a quota for each province based on its past output records.
Thailand's rice exports from Jan 1 to Oct 27 rose 15% year-on-year in to US$1.39 billion, though volumes rose only 0.3% to 5.86 million tonnes, according to the Foreign Trade Department.
It said Thai exporters obtained an average of $237 a tonne for rice this year, compared with $207 the year before.
Rachane Potjanasuntorn, the department's director-general, said rice shipments to Asia rose 18% to 1.89 million tones in the period while sales to the US rose nearly 70% to 421, 913 tonnes.
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