The Vietnam Food Association (VFA) has set new floor prices for export rice, effective since Wednesday, after many exporters slashed their selling prices.

The revised FOB floor prices are US$460 for each ton of the 5% broken rice, US$455 for the 10% broken rice, US$445 for the 15% broken rice and US$435 for the 25% broken rice.

The new floor prices are some US$20 per ton higher than the prices offered by exporters on Monday. Specifically, the offering prices of the 5% broken rice were US$435-445 per ton and the 25% broken rice was quoted at US$405-415 a ton this Monday.

According to VFA, the floor prices are adjusted to prevent rice exporters from lowering offering prices, affecting rice trading of Vietnam.

Lam Anh Tuan, director of Thinh Phat Company in Ben Tre, said rice traders were now urgently raising money to repay the bank loans that they had been granted to purchase 500,000 tons of summer-autumn rice for temporary storage.

Under pressure of bank debts, rice trading firms cannot boost buying, but they have to focus on their outlets. As a result, domestic rice prices have been falling since early September.

A rice exporter in Can Tho admitted: “The pressure of the loans for buying 500,000 tons forces us to cut selling prices to quickly gain money to settle bank debts.”

Local rice prices on Thursday were unchanged from Monday. The fresh paddy IR 50404 was priced at VND4,500-4,650 per kilo and the dried type at VND5,600-5,700 each kilo.

Material rice and finished rice prices remained unstable at VND7,250-7,500 and VND8,250-8,400 per kilo respectively.

The Saigon Times Daily