Deputy Commerce Minister Nattawut Saikuar has admitted the government's rice pledging scheme is ridden with debt.

Mr Nattawut, however, defended the scheme and said it is helping to stimulate the economy.

The deputy minister was grilled on the scheme in the House yesterday by Democrat MP for Phetchabun, Yuparat Bua-in.

"In principle, the rice pledging scheme is aimed at stabilising the prices of farm products to help farmers," Mr Nattawut said. "Such a scheme will be one million percent loss-ridden."

Mr Nattawut declined to reveal the exact losses accumulated in the scheme. He said he must wait to receive the conclusive figures at the end of the year.

The sale price of the pledged rice varies, depending on the government's negotiations with other governments, he said. The deputy minister defended the rice scheme and said it has successfully stimulated the economy.

The amount of value-added tax collected during the scheme increased by more than 100 billion baht, he said.

Mr Nattawut said the government has received slightly more than 13 million tonnes of pledged rice since 2011.

About 7 million tonnes of that has been sold, including about 4 million tonnes sold in government-to-government (G-to-G) deals, 466,000 tonnes sold locally and 2.57 tonnes delivered to organisations.

The government has earned about 97.2 billion baht from the sales of pledged rice and will re-invest that sum into the scheme.

The government has also sold 2.19 million tonnes of old rice stock that had been stored since before the pledging scheme. The sales of old stock earned 23.65 billion baht, but will not be used to fund the pledging scheme, he said.

Source: Bangkok post