Packaging rice for export at the Loc Troi Group's Thoai Son Food Co. Ltd in the Mekong Delta province of An Giang. Photo: VNA   

Vietnam expects to export about 5 million tonnes of rice in the first half, earning an estimated 2.36 billion USD, up 5.7% annually in volume but down 3.3% in value, reported the Ministry of Agriculture and Environment.

The average export price is estimated at 473.6 per tonne, down 8.6%.

In the global market, the rice trade keeps running into geopolitical headwinds. Even as energy prices have eased from earlier highs, logistics costs remain steep, pinching supply and demand and cooling trading activity. An easing of tensions in the Middle East is expected to help trade flows recover, but the world energy market is still rattled, and a full comeback is probably a long way off.

At home, the rice market has stayed steady in recent months. After the winter-spring harvest wrapped up, farmers in the Mekong Delta turned to tending and gathering the early summer-autumn crop. Trading in freshly cut paddy has been quiet, with prices barely budging.

On the production side, the nation’s total rice area was estimated at 4.57 million ha as of June, a 3.7% drop from a year earlier. Winter-spring plantings shrank 1.3% to 2.93 million ha, while the summer-autumn crop tumbled 7.8% to 1.64 million ha.

As for prices, the average procurement price for 5% broken rice in the first half hit 14,048 VND (0.54 USD) per kilogram, a gain of 1,644 VND compared with the second half of 2025. Meanwhile, 25% broken rice averaged 13,044 VND per kg, down 74 VND.

In An Giang, ordinary white rice at the retail level rose 544 VND per kg to 12,837 VND per kg.

According to Reuters, rice export prices across major Asian markets pushed higher in the second quarter, lifted by strong import demand from the Philippines./.