The soaring price of rice has triggered a supply and demand crunch that is hurting some of Asia's neediest nations, forcing them to spend more on imports, industry experts and officials say.
For the likes of Thailand and Vietnam, the world's two biggest exporters of the grain, the rising demand is a money-spinner with rice now selling at more than US$500 a tonne in Bangkok and nearly as much in Hanoi.
But from Bangladesh to the Philippines, from India to Indonesia, the squeeze is bad news as they seek to balance cost with the imperatives of feeding hungry populations and averting social chaos.
PHOTO: AP
"Every Asian government is well aware of the close relationship between political stability and the stability of the rice price," said Jonathan Pincus, the UN Development Programme's chief economist in Vietnam.
"So every government in the region will be doing all it can to maintain price stability, particularly for basic food grains," he said.
At the end of last month, Thailand's benchmark rice was trading at more than US$500 a tonne, a rise of more than US$100 from a month earlier and up from just US$325 a year ago.
Exporters in Vietnam meanwhile were setting prices at US$460 a tonne last month, the state news agency VNA said -- up more than 50 percent from a year ago.
"It's a global issue. All cereal prices are going up," said Andrew Speedy, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization's Vietnam representative. "This is quite serious. It's hurting everybody, especially the poor."
In the first two months of this year, Vietnam's rice exports brought in US$150 million , an increase of 78 percent from a year ago.
Much of the output is destined for the Philippines, whose President Gloria Arroyo asked Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung last month to guarantee stable supplies.
Unable to meet its own needs, the Philippines will import up to 2 million tonnes of rice this year, the government said.
Last year its harvest was 6.44 million tonnes, National Food Authority spokesman Emmanuel Salonga said, but it needs 11.8 million a year.
"Our population is growing and arable land is being converted to other uses so we cannot cope with demand," he said.
Indonesia's rice production has been outpaced by its population growth for more than a decade, said Mangara Tambunan from the country's Center for Economics and Social Studies.
"The government has to open the door to more imports. It should not be so reticent," he said.
Last year, Indonesia imported 1.5 million tonnes.
To ensure stability, a government agency buys and releases stocks and sets import duties. Heavily subsidized rice is also sold to millions of the poorest families, yet even those prices are rising.
"They're trying to get producers to sign long-term contracts," Pincus said, referring to Indonesia and the Philippines.
In Bangladesh, which has a population of 144 million, the price of rice has doubled in a year, vastly outpacing income levels, said Ruhul Amin, deputy head of the government's food planning unit.
"People are cutting all their other spending to focus only on food," Amin said.
But with 40 percent of the population relying on US$1 a day or less, the poorest are struggling to survive.
"They have to survive on a pittance, and the rises are causing a general feeling of gloom and depression," he said.
This year Bangladesh will need to import some 3 million tonnes due to damage caused by floods in the middle of last year and November's devastating cyclone.
Some of that is coming from neighboring India, but otherwise New Delhi has halted exports of non-basmati rice to keep its own domestic prices in check.
India allowed the export of 3.2 million tonnes of non-basmati rice in the first half of the current financial year, but since October no new contracts have been signed.
The move has upset the All India Rice Exporters' Association.
"Farmers react to high prices by producing more," said its president, Vijay Sethia. "Restricting trade just distorts the price signal."
For now, some nations appear insulated against rising prices. China, Japan and South Korea are largely self-sufficient and protect their rice sectors via steep import tariffs or heavy subsidies.
In Japan, the price of high-quality rice is even waning with falling demand as younger Japanese turn to bread and Western-style dishes.
As for China, its severe cold snap earlier this year is unlikely to impact production much as it was not the planting season.
The freeze may drive up prices, said Feng Lichen, a trader at the Dalian Commodity Exchange.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)