Study On The Competitiveness And Potential Of Indo-China Peninsula Region Rice Export In Chinese Market

Food security is a major strategic issue of worldwide concern.Under the new situation,China’s grain security strategy requires ensured general self-sufficiency in grain and absolute security of grain rations.As one of the rations,China’s rice security is facing the dilemma of tightening resource constraints and increasing "unnecessary"imports over the gap between production and demand under apparent serenity.The Indo-china peninsula region,which includes Cambodia,Laos,Myanmar,Thailand and Vietnam,is a major global rice export region and a major source of rice imports for China.With the deepening advancement of the“Belt and Road" initiative,agricultural trade and investment cooperation between China and the Indo-china peninsula economic corridor has been continuously strengthened.It is essential and important to study the export competitiveness and potential of Indo-china peninsula’s rice in Chinese market for fully ensure the absolute security of China’s rice rations.In view of this,based on the analysis of the general situation of rice industry development in Indo-china peninsula region,this study firstly compared and selected the export competitiveness measurement indexes through FAO and other public databases.The variety of rice export competitiveness in Indo-china peninsula region(to China)with the index of competitive advantage and the index of market penetration is then measured.Secondly,in order to analyze the reasons for the variety of Indo-china peninsula region’s rice export competitiveness in Chinese market,the factors affecting export competitiveness are summarized into four structural aspects(production cost,production efficiency,trade cost and real exchange rate),and their influences on export competitiveness are analyzed.Thirdly,the rice production potential in Indo-china peninsula region was analyzed based on elementary production factors(including epitaxial and connotative production potential).The factors of consumer demand and safe storage were taken into the framework of empirical analysis to calculate the potential of rice export in Indochina peninsula region under given constraints,thus to reflect its potential of rice competition.In order to discuss the possibility of conversion of export potential into actual export quantity,the index of export production ratio was used to analyze the stability of rice export in this region and its influencing factors.Finally,based on the above research conclusions,relevant enlightenment was obtained.The main conclusions of this study are as follows:Firstly,the Indo-china peninsula region is endowed with unique natural conditions suitable for the growth of rice,which makes it an important rice production region in the world and brings it a decisive role in the international rice market.However,problems such as low resource utilization rate,weak production infrastructure and low scale operation rate of rice still exist.Secondly,export competitiveness of rice in Chinese market of Indo-china peninsula is strong integrally,but varies differently among different countries in the peninsula.The market penetration rate in Chinese rice market has reached over 75%,with a maximum of 99.98%.The export competitiveness of Thai rice in the Chinese market is gradually declining,while that of Vietnamese,Cambodian,Burmese and Laotian rice keeps increasing.The export competitiveness of Vietnamese rice increased rapidly and it has become the most competitive rice exporter in the Chinese market.Thirdly,the increasing competitiveness of Indo-china peninsula region’s rice export in Chinese market is a long-term trend rather than a short-term cyclical fluctuation.Increase of rice production cost in Indo-china peninsula region is the main reason for the growth of export competitiveness.The increase of RMB real exchange rate has a significant but small effect on the improvement of export competitiveness,while the increase of productivity and the decrease of trade cost have a significant but smaller effect on the increase of it.The cost difference between Indo-china peninsula region and China’s rice production will not affect the competitiveness of rice export.In the future,Indo-china peninsula region will further increase its export competitiveness of rice in Chinese market.Fourthly,the increase of rice production in Indo-china peninsula is mainly due to the increase of yield.The potential of rice production is huge,and the potential of extension production increase is greater than that of connotative production increase.Under the given constraints,considering the domestic demand for rice and the safety stock,the Indo-china peninsula region still has the potential of about 128 million tons of rice to export,which is equivalent to the current level of China’s rice production.Fifthly,Indo-china peninsula region has superior rice export stability.The increase of international rice price will promote the transformation of export potential into actual export quantity,while the improvement of economic development level and the increase of population in Indo-china peninsula will increase domestic rice consumption and inhibit the transformation process.In combination with the above conclusions,this study believes that China should strengthen the regulation and control as well as grasp the scale and rhythm of rice import on the premise of ensuring stable domestic rice production capacity.There is also an urgent demand for China to accelerate the improvement of its rice international competitiveness by measures such as reducing production cost,improving rice quality,establishing industrial support policy system oriented to improving competitiveness.Meanwhile,agricultural production and trade cooperation with Indo-china peninsula should also be carried out actively,rationally and orderly.The possible innovations of this study are:(1)It is the first time to analyze from the perspective of a region that is China’s primary rice importer(namely Indo-china peninsula region),which fills in the blank of domestic related research.Compared with the study of a single country,the research object is more important and it includes the multi-country comparative study in the region.A new approach of regional rather than individual country cooperation is also proposed.(2)The main structural factors determining the export competitiveness are selected from various influencing factors of the competitiveness,and applied to the analysis of the export competitiveness of rice,which is an agricultural product with special importance.Thus,research on the export competitiveness of international bulk agricultural products is deepened.(3)Incorporating the consumer demand factor into the empirical analysis framework,measuring the rice export potential under the established constraints,and using the export output ratio rather than the export volume to analyze the export stability and its influencing factors.This may enrich and expand the research on export potential and rice trade on some degree,and provide a direction for further research.