Thai rice exporters have cut sales projections to Indonesia to 351,000 tonnes, far lower than their expected 820,000 tonnes, after failing to convince Jakarta to extend the shipment delivery date.

Bulog, Indonesia's state food agency, rejected the Thai request to put off the shipment date to May from the end of March.

"There are some difficulties with the cargo ships. However, we've also learned Indonesia decided to buy the balance from Vietnam at a lower price," said Sombat Chalermwutinan, president of Asia Golden Rice Co.

This is the second rice deal between Indonesia and Thailand in the past two months. Last December, Indonesia agreed to import 250,000 tonnes of 5% grade white rice from Thailand.

A month later, Bulog called for bids to buy 170,000 tonnes of several grades of white rice and eight rice exporters offered to sell a total of 820,000 tonnes. Bulog initially indicated it would accept all the bids for prompt delivery in March.

Mr Sombat said Vietnam's currency devaluation last week made its rice exports even more competitive with those of Thailand. Vietnam's 5% grade white rice costs US$450-460 a tonne, against $530-540 for Thai rice.

The group of eight Thai exporters plans to complete the sale of 351,000 tonnes of rice to Indonesia by next month. It comprises Asia Golden Rice, Chaiyaporn Rice, Capital Rice, and Ponglarp, which each won bids to sell 62,000 tonnes of rice, Siam Indiga and Thai Hua, which each won 35,000-tonne bids, and Chia Meng and Siam First Rice, which won bids for 23,000 and 10,000 tonnes respectively.

Mr Sombat said the Indonesia shipment late last year and a Bangladesh order increased the country's rice export volume to 9.03 million tonnes in 2010.

Asia Golden Rice shipped about 1.6 million tonnes of rice last year, making it Thailand's largest rice exporter for the third consecutive year.

He expects export volume to remain bullish this year considering higher overseas demand,and because large producers and Indian exporters remain vague about their rice export policies.

Weather in China will significantly affect Thailand's rice industry this year, just as natural disasters forced major grower Bangladesh to buy 141,000 tonnes of Thai rice last year, up from only 43 tonnes in 2009.

Bangladesh has indicated its intention to buy 300,000 tonnes of parboiled rice from the Thai Commerce Ministry this year.

Source: Bangkok Post