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The Commerce Ministry has designed three strategies, bidding, government-to-government negotiations and barter deals, to release its huge rice stockpile in preparation for the launch of a price-intervention programme for the coming cultivation season.

     Caretaker Commerce Minister Chaiya Sasomsap said the ministry must urgently open the bidding for rice in its stockpiles before the end of this month. The ministry has to release space for the new rice expected to enter warehouses under the government price-intervention programme, which will start next month.

The Foreign Trade Department will be responsible for the bidding and the barter negotiations. The ministry has resumed its management of rice after losing the task to the Prime Minister's Office during Samak Sundaravej's regime. The ministry is negotiating with some countries to sell rice under government-to-government contracts. In addition, the ministry wants to release about 1 million tonnes of rice in the early stages, Chaiya said.

Malaysia and some countries in the Middle East have good potential for the Thai government to achieve government-to-government deals.

The government has more than 5.3 million tonnes of paddy rice in its stockpiles, of which 2.1 million tonnes are from the previous harvest and 3.23 million tonnes from this year's second crop price-intervention project.