Philippines is Vietnam's largest rice consumer market
According to a report of Ministry of Agriculture and Environment, rice export volume in June 2025 is estimated at 700,000 tonnes with a value of 364.4 million USD, bringing total rice export volume and value in the first 6 months of 2025 to 4.9 million tonnes and 2.54 billion USD, up 7.6% in volume but down 12.2% in value compared to the same period in 2024.
Average export price of rice in the first 6 months of 2025 is estimated at 517.5 USD/tonne, down 18.4% compared to the same period in 2024. The Philippines is Vietnam's largest rice consumer market with a market share of 43.4%. Ivory Coast and Ghana are the next two largest markets with market shares of 10.7% and 10.5%, respectively. Compared to the same period last year, value of rice exports in the first 5 months of 2025 to the Philippines market decreased by 17.4%, the Ivory Coast market increased by 88.6% and the Ghana market increased by 61.4%. In group of 15 largest export markets, value of rice exports increased the most in Bangladesh market with an increase of 293.2 times and decreased the most in Malaysian market with a decrease of 54.7%.
Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Environment Phung Duc Tien said that rice exports have been on a downward trend since the beginning of 2025 due to large market supply, low export prices and import markets are limiting purchases to wait for prices to drop.
Export plan target for 2025 is estimated at 5.7 billion USD, down 0.9% compared to the same period in 2024, of which the first 6 months of the year need to reach 2.6 billion USD, the last 6 months of the year need to reach 3.1 billion USD. However, according to estimated export figures by June 2025, export turnover of the rice industry may decrease more than the set target, estimated at only about 5.5 billion USD, down 4.4% compared to the same period in 2024.
Participating in rice industry value chain in stages such as drying, milling and polishing, Mr. Bui Le Quoc Bao, General Director of TCO Holdings Joint Stock Company, said that Vietnam's rice exports in 2025 will likely decrease in both volume and price compared to 2024. Because room for rice exports in 2025 is very small in the context of the base level of 2024 being already high, while there are too many unfavorable factors related to the market, especially when India loosens the rice export restriction.
Accelerating to reach the export target
In the world market, as of early June 2025, the price of rough rice futures for July 2025 traded on the CBOT (rough rice price) reached a lowest of 12.3 USD/cwt on May 13 and a highest of 13.4 USD/cwt on May 28. On average, in May 2025, the price of rough rice reached 12.9 USD/cwt, down 19.7% compared to the same period last year. On average, in the first 5 months of 2025, the price of rough rice reached 13.8 USD/cwt, down 14.1% compared to the same period last year.
In domestic market, average rice purchase price as of early June 2025 in Tien Giang province tended to decrease compared to the same period last year. Specifically, the price of IR 50404 rice reached 6,519 VND/kg, down 9.4%; the price of Nang Hoa rice reached 7,838 VND/kg, down 1.6%; the price of OM 5451 rice reached 6,819 VND/kg, down 6.5%; the price of Dai Thom rice reached 8,238 VND/kg, down 0.5%. Currently, the world's rice supply is abundant and prices tend to decrease.
According to the latest data from Vietnam Food Association (VFA), the price of 5% broken rice from Vietnam remains at 382 USD/tonne, equal to the same grade of Thai rice. Meanwhile, Indian rice is 2 USD/tonne lower and Pakistani rice is 4 USD/tonne higher. With 25% broken rice from Vietnam currently standing at 357 USD/tonne, 11 USD/tonne lower and 9 USD lower than the same grade of Thai and Indian rice, respectively; but 5 USD/tonne higher than Pakistani rice.
In the world's most important market, the Philippines, a report from the country's Ministry of Agriculture said that as of the end of June 2025, amount of imported rice was 2.17 million tonnes, 163,000 tonnes less than the same period in 2024. As of June 19, the Philippines' rice imports from Vietnam reached 1.58 million tonnes.
Notably, amount of rice imported from Myanmar skyrocketed to nearly 300,000 tonnes, surpassing Thailand to take second place; Thailand with 125,000 tonnes ranked third. Another notable point is that the abundant supply of cheap rice from India does not have an advantage in this market when it only reached 19,000 tonnes, ranking fifth, lower than Pakistan with 74,000 tonnes.
According to experts, recently, Philippine Government has always expressed its desire to diversify rice supply and increase in rice imported from Myanmar is proof of that. In addition, the Philippines also wants to increase imports from other sources, especially Thailand and Cambodia, but has encountered difficulties in quality and price. For many years, Filipinos have been familiar with the quality of Vietnamese rice and its affordable prices.
To achieve export target, Ministry of Agriculture and Environment believes that it is necessary to continue to maintain export market share, taking advantage of competitive advantages to increase market share of fragrant rice when Thailand and India are the two largest suppliers of this segment to the US market but are subject to high tax rates of 36% and 26% respectively.
In addition, it is necessary to continue to maintain traditional markets with large market shares such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia to maintain the market. Enterprises need to seek more export markets and diversify input materials to reduce tax pressure. Research to strongly shift to the EU, South Korea, Japan, Singapore markets (for processed products such as vermicelli, noodles, macaroni, pho); find solutions to reduce logistics costs to expand to potential markets such as Ghana, Ivory Coast and UAE with fragrant rice and white rice.

Source: Vitic/ congthuong.vn