Thailand’s exports of fresh mango in the first quarter this year increased 130%, to about 1.6 billion baht compared to the same period last year, while exports of sticky rice increased 13%, to about one billion baht during the same period.
Chotima Iemsawasdikul, director-general of the Trade Negotiations Department, said today that the TasteAtlast website’s recent ranking of Thai mango sticky as the world’s second best rice pudding has further increased of the popularity of the dessert in numerous countries, offering a good opportunity for Thai exporters to increase exports and make use of the FTAs Thailand has with ASEAN, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, India, Chile, Peru and Hong Kong.
Thailand is currently the world’s fifth largest mango exporter and the second largest exporter of sticky rice.
Chotima said that, of the nine ASEAN countries, only Laos and Cambodia charge 5% import tax on Thai mango. China, Japan, Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand, India, Chile and Peru do not charge import tax, while South Korea charges 24%.
Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong, Laos, Cambodia, Singapore, Brunei and Chile do not impose import taxes on Thai sticky rice, while China has cut the import tax to 50%, Indonesia 30% and Malaysia 32%.
Frozen ready-to-eat mango sticky rice is also exported to 16 countries where import tax is zero.
