Thai trade representatives last week expressed concern over the declining quality of Thai rice exports, saying the government should come up with a strong campaign promoting Thai rice quality to explain the rise in prices.

The government's rice-mortgage scheme will push up the export price.

Somjin Plengkhum, a Thai trade official in New York, said Thai rice exports are facing a problem of contamination. Some importers have mixed high-quality Thai rice, mainly jasmine rice, with inferior rice. This causes confusion among consumers.

The mixed rice has created a bad reputation for Thai jasmine rice. Consumers are mistaken about the quality of Thai rice and that will make exporting Thai rice difficult in the near future, Somjin said.

American consumers with high purchasing power were willing to pay more for high-grade rice, he added.

The Thai government issues a trademark guarantee on 92 per cent of Thai jasmine rice, but the problem occurs when Thai rice exported in bulk is re-packaged by importers.

The US is one of the largest buyers of Thai jasmine rice, ordering 300,000-400,000 tonnes a year. Under the pledging scheme, the price of jasmine rice is expected to rise from US$1,000 to $1,100-$1,200 a tonne.

Phaichit Viboontanasarn, trade counsellor in Beijing, said wealthy consumers would continue to eat Thai jasmine rice, as they focus on quality rather than price. But middle-income consumers and restaurants may shift to eating cheaper rice from other countries or mixing Thai rice with other rice to reduce costs.

The government should heavily publicise the trustworthiness of Thai jasmine rice and solve the problem of contamination, Phaichit said.

China has faced natural disasters and drought, so it would still need to import rice to serve domestic demand.

Source: The Nation