Thailand has set a 7.5 million tonne rice export goal for this year, which is marginally less than the 7.69 million tonne export goal for 2022. Ronnarong Phoolpipat, director-general of the Foreign Ministry, claims
The director-general of the foreign trade department, Ronnarong Phoolpipat, claims that after speaking with the Thai Rice Exporters Association, the department discovered that there is still a market for Thai rice worldwide.
He stated that the Thailand Rice Convention, an international forum for rice stakeholders from all over the world, is one activity the Commerce Ministry intends to use to continue to promote Thai rice exports.
Mr. Ronnarong cautioned against baht volatility, pointing out that rising exchange rates might make Thai rice more costly than rice from rival countries.
Thailand shipped 7.69 million tonnes of rice last year, exceeding the goal of 7.5 million tonnes set by the Commerce Ministry, according to the Foreign Trade Department.
From 6.3 million tonnes shipped in 2021, the export volume increased by 22%, and the value in baht grew by 25.1% to 138 billion baht.
At $3.97 billion, the export worth in US dollars increased 14.6% from the previous year.
After India, which exported 21.9 million tonnes of rice in 2017, Thailand was ranked as the second-largest rice exporter in the globe in 2017.
With 6.31 million kilos of rice exported, Vietnam came in third.
Iraq purchased 1.6 million tonnes of Thai paddy last year, an increase of 458% from the previous year. China imported 750,000 tonnes, South Africa imported 775,000 tonnes (down 2.26%), and South Africa finished in third.
The Foreign Trade Department revealed that Thailand exported 11.1 million tonnes of tapioca products last year, valued at $4.4 billion, the highest amount in 15 years.
According to Mr. Ronnarong, the department and four organizations involved in the tapioca industry have decided to establish the export goal for tapioca products at 9 million tonnes this year as the total tapioca production for 2022.
Because of the cassava mosaic disease and the floods in the latter part of last year, the projection is down from 34.9 million tonnes in a previous projection, he said.
Source: BangkokPost.com
