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G. Chandrashekhar

Washington , Dec. 18

EVEN as the US rice industry is continuously seeking to identify access barriers in priority markets and implement aggressive actions to remove the barriers, efforts are afoot to cultivate new markets and consolidate existing ones.

Upset with the European Union for granting duty derogation to long grain rice (Indian Basmati rice), the US rice industry is determined to continue to lobby the EU for what it calls a level-playing field.

"We perceive the margin of preference trade concession granted by EU as a threat to market access," remarked an industry official adding that several seminars and meetings were held during fiscal 2003 to communicate US concerns.

The rice industry here is keenly following the EU plans to renegotiate the margin of preference trade concession. Indeed industry officials are keen to know the Indian perspective on the subject as they believe a high priced basmati rice in EU will help push bigger volumes of American long grain rice.

As a very significant part of global rice production and consumption is in the Asian region, the US is strategically targeting markets away from Asia and closer home like Mexico. Annual rice imports into Mexico have risen from around 4,00,000 tonne in 2001 to 5,50,000 tonne in 2003 following US efforts. For 2004, imports are projected at 6,00,000 tonne.

An official of USA Rice Federation told Business Line: "We conduct overseas market programmes and food aid activities in more than 30 countries. For instance, this year we explored new market opportunities including parboiled rice for Mexico specifically for the foodservice industry, long grain rice for Turkey and Brazil, and rice products for people living with HIV/AIDS."

In relation to its Asian competitors, American rice prices are considered high. It is actually an anomalous situation as US rice yields per hectare are rather high at close to 4 t/ha (versus India's 2 t/ha) and there is an element of subsidy in production. However, for promoting exports, there are several schemes the US adopts for international rice marketing including credit and credit guarantee programmes.

The share of American rice in global rice trade has ranged between 11 and 14 per cent or in volume terms between 2.5 million and 3.8 million tonne in recent years, while exports constitute almost 50 per cent of domestic production which is in excess of 6 ml.t. per annum.

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