Agriculture and Cooperatives Ministry to discuss on ASEAN Emergency Rice Reserve

BANGKOK, 13 October 2009 (NNT) – The Agriculture and Cooperatives Ministry tabled a discussion on the ASEAN Emergency Rice Reserve (ERR) system plan and consideed sharing a portion to the Philippines which has recently been affected by Typhoon Ketsana.

Mr. Thammarat Wanglee, Advisor to the Minister of Agriculture and Cooperatives summarized the essence of the 12th Project Steering Committee (PSC) meeting, which would be held in Laos, that there would be 3 discussion topics as follows:

1. The funding for ASEAN Plus Three Emergency Rice Reserve (APTERR) initiation which involves the consideration on the conditions, funding amount, and an appropriate funding period for the Endowment Fund (EF).

2. ERR agreement draft process which would consequently become the APTERR regulations, due to be presented in the upcoming 31st ASEAN Ministers on Agriculture and Forestry (AMAF) and the 9th AMAF Plus Three meetings in November 2009 in Brunei. APTERR is expected to fully operate by March 2010.

3. The consideration on rice allocation to Laos under the Poverty Eradication project and Myanmar to support the Post-Nargis Humanitarian Assistance as well as the Philippines which has been recently impacted by Typhoon Ketsana.