Commerce Minister Boonsong Teriyaphirom has ordered the Foreign Trade Department immediately to investigate allegations of secret sales of rice, which could cause prices to slump in the open market.

"It's probably a rumour aimed at dampening rice prices in the market. The government has no plan to release rice from its stockpiles at this time," he said yesterday.

A report came out yesterday claiming that a politician from the Pheu Thai Party was quietly arranging to sell the government's rice to local traders at below cost. It said the ministry had tried to dump the latest stocks of rice from the 2011-12 main crop on to local traders and millers in Saraburi.

Boonsong said the news was likely untrue as the ministry had not yet allowed any agencies to release government rice.

Government rice stocks are under the Foreign Trade Department. No one can remove rice from inventory without approval by him.

The government is not worried about the decline in rice exports as its pledging project is aimed at helping local farmers, he said. To promote rice exports, he will lead a roadshow to Bangladesh and Indonesia next month and finalise rice sales under government-to-government contracts.

From January 1 to April 24, Thai rice exports dropped by almost half to 2 million tonnes from 3.7 million tonnes during the same period last year.

Source: The Nation