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RICE
gained for a fifth day as the extent of the devastation
in Myanmar from a cyclone became clearer with as many as
100,000 people dead, and as Nigeria suspended levies to
encourage purchases from overseas.
Rice
futures, which touched a record last month, rose as much
as 3.5 percent to $22.35 per 100 pounds on the Chicago
Board of Trade. Cyclone Nargis left 5,000 square
kilometers of Myanmar’s Irrawaddy delta underwater,
Unicef said.
The
storm struck the country’s main rice-growing area on May
3, worsening a food crisis that’s triggered unrest from
Haiti to Egypt. Surging food costs have raised the risk
of malnutrition for 1 billion Asians, according to the
Asian Development Bank, as wheat, corn and soybeans have
risen to records this year.
“The
crop damage in Myanmar has fueled concern over tight
global supplies and prompted importers to rush for the
grain,” Hiroyuki Kikukawa, general manager of the
research department at IDO Securities Co., said Thursday
in Tokyo. “Any supply disruptions may stoke panic
buying.”
Nigeria,
the world’s second-largest rice importer, dropped import
levies Wednesday for six months to ease prices,
according to a statement from the agriculture ministry.
The tariff cuts are meant “to cushion the
impact of the global food crisis on vulnerable”
citizens, the statement said.
Myanmar
had been expected to export 600,000 metric tons of rice
this year, including to Sri Lanka and Bangladesh,
according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization.
The Rome-based UN agency had forecast world exports at
29.9 million tons.
Net
importer
IF
Myanmar becomes a net importer it “will seriously affect
the prices of rice globally,” Anthony Lam, regional
general manager at Golden Resources Development
International Ltd., said Wednesday in an interview with
Bloomberg Television in Hong Kong.
The
Chicago rice contract, which touched a record $25.07 per
100 pounds on April 24, has gained as much as 8.3
percent since May 1. The benchmark export price of Thai
100-percent grade B white rice gained 10 percent to a
record $941 a metric ton this week, according to the
Thai Rice Exporters Association.
The
Philippines, the world’s biggest rice importer, will
seek shipments “aggressively” after the disaster in
Myanmar, according to Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap.
“Taking a cue from what happened to Myanmar, we have
reports that rice demand is spiking,” Yap said Wednesday
in a telephone interview.
Global
food prices will stay above 2004 levels through 2015,
according to World Bank president Robert Zoellick.
Droughts, low levels of food stockpiles, growing
consumption in
India
and China and fuel prices are contributing to higher
costs, Zoellick said yesterday at a news conference in
Mexico City.
The
death toll from cyclone Nargis may reach 100,000 as more
bodies are found, Shari Villarosa, the
US
charge d’affaires at the embassy in Yangon, said in a
conference call yesterday. (Bloomberg) |
