Thai rubber firms need loan to stockpile

Thai rubber firms need loan to stockpile

Dow Jones, Singapore

Thai rubber exporters and producers are willing to stockpile rubber to shore up global prices but will need a soft loan of 2 billion baht from the government to do so, a senior industry official said Saturday.

Choositt Ophaswongse, president of the Thai Rubber Association, told Dow Jones Newswires that Thai rubber exporters agree with the government's plan to reduce exports to boost prices.

He added that to stockpile 100,000 tons of rubber, the Thai government needs to extend a 2 billion bath soft loan to private exporters and producers.

He said he has already made a proposal to the Thai agriculture ministry and that this will be discussed in Tuesday's cabinet meeting.

Choositt, who was in Singapore over the weekend, to attend an Asian rubber industry meeting, said exporters don't have the financial means to stockpile rubber and thus need government funding.

He was reacting to a statement by the Indonesian Trade Minister Rini Soewandi, who said the Thai government hasn't received much cooperation from commercial producers who object to the international tripartite rubber agreement.

"Some in the private sector aren't cooperating so the Thai authorities have to solve this problem," Rini told reporters in a press briefing held in Jakarta last week.

But Choositt said this statement is "not true."

"We want to cooperate, but we can't do it by ourselves because of financial restrictions...so we urge the government to help us in providing soft loans to us," he said.

Ministers from the world's top rubber producers - Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia - signed in December a joint ministerial declaration to cut combined rubber output by 4 percent, and exports by 10 percent in 2002.