Vietnam Food Association (VFA) expected the country to export more than six million tons of rice in 2021, citing high global demand as a main reason.

Rice storage of Vinafood1. Photo: Le Nam.

“The Covid-19 pandemic has been a key factor for Vietnam’s major rice import markets such as the Philippines and Africa to keep signing new buying contracts, while there has been a growing demand for rice in Asia,” stated the VFA in a recent report.

According to the VFA, Vietnam’s rice exports in the first quarter remain positive as major rice buyers of the region, including China, Bangladesh and the Philippines are purchasing a large amount of rice, in turn keeping the price for Vietnam’s rice exports at a high level of US$503 per ton.

Experts are calling for local producers to focus on product quality and study the target market’s preferences to ensure efficiency in the trading process.

“This is the right time for Vietnam to restructure its rice exports,” stated the VFA.

A report from the Import-Export Department under the Ministry of Industry and Trade noted as of January 18, 2021, the authority has issued rice export licenses for 205 traders.

Rice is among Vietnam’s key export staples with turnover US$3 billion for 6.15 tons of rice in 2020, down 3.5% year-on-year in volume but up 9.3% in value.

On January 13, The Ministry of Agricultural and Rural Development (MARD) held a ceremony marking the export of Vietnam’s first batch of rice in 2021 by Trung An Hi-tech Farming Company, located in the southern city of Can Tho.

This special shipment with volume of 1,600 tons will be delivered to Malaysia and Singapore, those among Vietnam’s top 10 rice buyers.

On top of that, Trung An is preparing to deliver an order of nearly 2,000 tons of rice to Germany.

Deputy Minister of Agricultural and Rural Development Le Quoc Doanh said the event marks an important milestone as Vietnam has just recently signed the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) on November 15, 2020, consisting of 10 ASEAN members and five countries having a free trade deal with the bloc (China, South Korea, Japan, Australia, New Zealand).