Season greetings from the AP Weekly Price Monitor team!
We are pleased to share with you the latest AP Weekly Price Monitor (27 December). You can find this and previous issues here.
Over the past week, staple food commodity prices remained relatively stable in all reporting countries, except for maize prices in Viet Nam that increased 13 percent from the previous week.
Under regional highlights, Thailand and Bangladesh celebrated the 40th anniversary of diplomatic relations and both nations agreed to develop comprehensive economic cooperation. They came to terms on mutual cooperation in the areas of agriculture, fishery, and livestock. In this regard, the Bangladeshi government expressed interest in purchasing Thai rice (Royal Thai Government, 22 December 2012).
Under national policy highlights, China announced that is taking into consideration increasing rewards to farmers whose land has been expropriated, by breaking the legal compensation ceiling and covering them with a social security package. Currently, a draft amendment on Land Administration Law has been submitted to the bimonthly session of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC).
Regarding the weather situation over the last two weeks:
· The tropical Cyclone Evan passed over Samoa on 13 and 14 December and in 17 December the Government declared Samoa in state of emergency. According to an OCHA report, Samoa’s economy will be as hard hit by the impact of Tropical Cyclone Evan as it was by the 2009 tsunami that destroyed 20 villages and killed 143 people. The Government of Samoa has completed its rapid assessment of the agriculture sector, and a report on the findings is expected soon. For the time being, food assistance is provided to affected areas and evacuation centres (OCHA, Situation Report 6, 23 December 2012).
· The Ministry of Agriculture in Fiji mobilized teams to carry out preliminary surveys on damages to Western and Northern divisions caused by Cyclone Evan (Ministry of Agriculture, 19 December 2012).
· Given the forecasts about a serious shortage of water to irrigate the upcoming winter-spring crop in central Viet Nam, the Quang Nam Department of Agriculture and Rural Development has instructed localities to use short and medium-term rice varieties apart from the main varieties to mitigate drought impacts (Government of Viet Nam, 21 December 2012).
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more details, please see the
full report.
With best regards,
AP Weekly Price Monitor team
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