India’s basmati export may go up as flood impacts Pak crop.

New Delhi: Large basmati rice buyers in the gulf region may now start buying more from India as the recent floods in Pakistan have severely hit the agriculture activity there.

Analysts say that such a situation augurs well for the Indian basmati rice exporters as they would be able to serve the continually increasing demand for the basmati from West Asia, US and UK which have been importing from Pakistan.

“The recent floods in Pakistan have been considered to be one of the deadliest in the last 20 years. The flood is likely to have an adverse impact on the entire agricultural production in the region. However, the timing of the flood in the second half of July is particularly damaging for basmati rice as basmati is grown in the latter half of the kharif sowing season. This situation is also likely to lead to a shortage of basmati rice and any drop in the production of basmati paddy in Pakistan will prove to be a blessing for Indian aromatic rice producers ,” Komal Iyer, head equity research, Juniper Advisors said.

Analysts said that large basmati buyers in the Gulf region have expressed concerns over the performance of basmati crop in Pakistan. “With reduction in basmati production in Pakistan these buyers fear that they may not be able to source enough basmati rice to meet the growing demand. They could be looking at buying larger quantities of basmati rice from India,” KSR Reddy, research head SPAa Capital, said.

According to Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority, the country exported more than 2.3 million tonne of basmati rice during last fiscal. Pakistan also exported close to 2 million tonne of aromatic rice during the same period. Exports to middle east accounted for 76% followed by UK and US at 9 % each and the rest of the world at 15 %.

Source : financialexpress.com