We are pleased to send you the new issue of the FAO Rice Price Update. 

·         The FAO All Rice Price Index (2002-04=100) averaged 222.2 points in April 2019, virtually unchanged from its value a month earlier. The most notable development in April concerned the Aromatic Index. It rose by 2.7 percent to an 8-month high of 217.2 points, buoyed by firming basmati quotations in the context of inflationary pressure in Pakistan and preparatory purchases ahead of Ramadan. The Lower and Higher Quality Indica Indices also strengthened by around one point, each. On the other hand, the Japonica Index subsided by 1.0 percent, following the retreat of Japan and the Republic of Korea from the market and a turn of weather that raised planting expectations in California.

·         April quotations of Indica rice tended to increase across much of Asia, except in India and Myanmar, where prices dipped on poor buying interest and pressure from offseason harvests. In Thailand, concerns over water supplies for irrigation lent support to export prices, whereas gains in Pakistan came in the wake of increases to fuel costs and sales to East Africa and China. With the end of the winter-spring harvest in sight, demand from Filipino buyers also prolonged the recovery of Vietnamese export values. In the Americas, long-grain prices edged down in the United States, amid disappointment over no US awards in an Iraqi tender, while they held steady in Uruguay. Instead, they strengthened in Brazil, underpinned by a resumption of sales to Iraq and Venezuela, and in Argentina, thanks to interest from regional buyers.

·         According to the Index, despite recent months’ slight firmness, international rice prices between January and April 2019 were on average 2.2 percent below their level in the corresponding period of 2018.