13 research outputs found
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Rice millers - August 2020 survey round
No full textThis is the second policy note in a series presenting the results from telephone surveys with approximately 400 rice millers in three important rice-growing regions of Myanmar: Ayeyarwady, Bago, and Yangon. Mills are the most important link between farms and consumers in the rice value chain. In addition to drying, milling, processing, and storing rice, mills also buy paddy directly from farmers and often provide farmers with inputs on credit. Thus, any shocks to rice mills will impact both rural rice-producing households and urban consumers. To understand how the COVID-19 crisis and the corresponding policy responses are affecting the business activities of rice mills in Myanmar, we are conducting a panel telephone survey with rice millers. Interviews have been conducted every 30 days starting in July 2020, continuing through the monsoon harvests and ending in November. This report presents the results from the second survey round conducted in August. Interviews were completed by August 22, before a second wave of COVID-19 infections began to spread widely in Myanmar.Non-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; MAPSA; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food IndustryDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Agricultural commodity traders - Synopsis of results from three survey rounds through early August 2020
No full textTo understand how Myanmar’s crop marketing system has been affected by the COVID-19 crisis, phone interviews were conducted with more than 100 agricultural commodity traders roughly every 30 days from late May until early August 2020. A round of qualitative interviews was also conducted with key informants on land-trading routes to China, Thailand, and India.
Key findings
• Traders who reported that the pandemic is affecting their business in any way declined from 77 percent in late May to 43 percent in early August. Buying and marketing challenges were the most common disruptions reported in early August, followed by difficulties in collecting repayments on credit lent out to farmers. Increasing numbers of traders also reported difficulties in obtaining new loans or credit for their business.
• Higher shares of traders reported year-on-year decreases both in credit provision and in wholesale trading volumes in August compared to June.
• More traders report a decrease in competition than an increase since the crisis began.
• Crop buying and selling prices have been stable on average between April and August.
• Border gate closures at the China (Muse), Thailand (Myawaddy), and India (Tamu) borders have resulted in drastic reductions in overland exports of agricultural commodities since March 2020. Key informants said that there has been almost no crop trading to China and India, while exports to Thailand are down over half compared to a year ago.
Recommended actions
• Coordinate domestic transport restrictions put in place in response to the recent second wave of COVID-19 to allow continued domestic trade of agricultural commodities.
• Facilitate safe exports of agricultural commodities. This should be done with formal agreements and government investments in monitoring and infrastructure. If borders remain closed into the monsoon harvest season later in 2020, farmers should expect to receive poor prices for their crops.
• Quickly expand the provision of loans for working capital to crop traders (CERP Action 2.1.1). This will enable traders to continue their buying activities through the coming harvest and prevent a possible decline in competition in the sector.
• Continue the waiver of the 2 percent withholding tax for crop traders (CERP Action 2.1.3).Non-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; MAPSADSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Rice millers - July 2020 survey round
No full textTo understand how Myanmar’s rice value chain has been affected by the COVID-19 crisis, a series of phone interviews are being conducted with rice millers from Ayeyarwady, Bago, and Yangon. This report presents results from the first round of interviews that was conducted in July 2020 with 404 medium- and large-scale mill owners and managers. Key Findings Strikingly, 60 percent of mills are anticipating a revenue drop of at least 30 percent this year compared to 2019. Only 3 percent of mills are expecting an increase in revenue. Just over half of the mills interviewed experienced disruptions in selling milled rice and in buying paddy. However, those impacts have lessened considerably, as only 15 percent of millers reported experiencing those disruptions in the past 30 days. Almost all mills regarded byproduct sales as important to their business. Roughly half reported no changes in byproduct prices compared to 2019, but one-quarter reported price increases, while the other quarter reported decreases. Mills from Ayeyarwady have been more negatively impacted by lower byproduct prices than elsewhere. For most mills, both paddy purchase and rice sales prices are now slightly higher than the 2019 average. Interestingly, prices increased more for low-quality varieties than for high-quality varieties. Margins for low-quality varieties have increased relative to 2019, while they have decreased for high-quality varieties. Thus, mills producing larger quantities of high-quality rice now may be adversely affected by lower margins. Recommended Actions Continue and expand the government relief loan program offered to small and medium enterprises – Action 2.1.1 under the COVID-19 Economic Relief Plan (CERP) of the Government of Myanmar. This would assist mills struggling with lower revenues and buffer smaller mills from further shocks during the crisis. Government should extend tax relief to mills hard hit by the COVID-19 crisis through waivers or deferrals (CERP Action 2.1.3). Government should facilitate exports by putting in place easier licensing processes (CERP Action 2.4.3), such as allowing licenses to be obtained online.Non-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; MAPSADSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Rice millers - September 2020 survey round
No full textThis is the third policy note in a series presenting the results from rounds of telephone surveys with rice millers in three important rice-growing regions of Myanmar: Ayeyarwady, Bago, and Yangon. Mills are the most important link between farms and consumers in the rice value chain. Thus, any shocks to rice mills will impact both rural rice-producing households as well as urban consumers.Non-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; MAPSA; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food IndustryDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Rice millers - September 2020 survey round [in Burmese]
No full textNon-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; MAPSA; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food IndustryDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Agricultural value chains in a fragile state: The case of rice in Myanmar
No full textThe large majority of extreme poor in the world lives in fragile states. Yet, despite the enormous importance of these areas for global poverty and food insecurity, there is relatively little research examining how agricultural value chains, crucial for assuring food security, respond and adapt to such contexts. This paper analyzes Myanmar’s rice value chain – its most important staple and biggest value chain – during the economic collapse and political instability caused by a military coup in early 2021. It relies on unique data collected with a large sample of rice retailers and millers before and after the coup. Despite many challenges in the rice value chain after the coup – most importantly linked to banking and transport – rice processing and trade continued, assuring availability of rice in most retail markets and illustrating the resilience of the value chain to such major shock. While processing margins were mostly stable, an increased distribution margin (between rice millers and retailers) led to 11 percent higher average retail prices after the coup, implying welfare losses of almost USD 0.5 billion for the country. Using a market-pair regression method, we further find that localized violence near sellers and buyers, distances traveled, and distance of vendors from borders are associated with significantly increased rice price dispersion between rice retailers and mills. Despite the amalgam of problems to address in such settings, prioritizing the easing of transport restrictions and facilitating cheap and safe spatial arbitrage of food products would likely help prevent further food price inflation, assure higher farm prices, and therefore improve welfare.PRIFPRI3; CRP2; ISI; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food Industry; IFPRIOA; MyanmarSSP; DCADevelopment Strategies and Governance (DSG); Transformation Strategies; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Effects of COVID-19 restrictions on mechanization service providers and mechanization Equipment retailers: Insights from phone surveys in Myanmar
No full textCOVID-19 continues to plague global food security not only directly through health effects but also indirectly through responses that restrict key economic functions of the agri-food sector. De-spite the growing literature on the effects of COVID-19 on the agri-food sector, evidence on cer-tain players like mechanization service providers (MSP) and mechanization equipment retailers (MER) remain scarce. This study provides insights into the effects of COVID-19 restrictions on MSP and MER in Myanmar, where the majority of MSP and MER are relatively new and poten-tially vulnerable to these economic shocks, using an unbalanced panel data from five rounds of phone surveys. We find that direct responses to COVID-19 involving movement restrictions, as well as disruptions in the market that led to increased cost and reduced availability of machinery and equipment, and growing financial challenges, had significantly negative effects on revenue prospects, service delivery, sales of machines and equipment by MSE and MER. Our analyses based on rare multi-round surveys during a single production season also reveal important dy-namics in MSP’s decision-making; negative revenue prospects at particular period can further hurt revenue prospects in subsequent periods, which is consistent with the hypotheses that agents like MSP who had incurred significant sunk-cost in machines can engage in more desperate and thus potentially suboptimal business practice to recover the sunk-cost. This may result in a vi-cious cycle of declining revenues in the future in the face of shocks like COVID-19. Overall, evi-dence suggests that, policies to minimize movement restrictions, various financial support, and mitigate any pessimism at the beginning of production season are all important to make sure MSP and MER continue to function effectively during the COVID-19 pandemic that persists in 2021.Non-PRIFPRI1; CRP2; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food Industry; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural EconomiesDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Agricultural commodity traders - Late June 2020 survey round
No full textCrop traders comprise the mid-stream of Myanmar’s food supply chain, forming important links between farms and food processors, exporters, commodity exchange centers, and urban food markets. Traders engage in a variety of business activities ranging from wholesalers that buy, store, grade, and sell commodities to brokers that facilitate crop sales on commissions. Many traders have strong and direct ties to farmers, often providing farmers with agricultural inputs on credit to strengthen relationships and to build business later in the year when crops are harvested and sold. These connections to the farm have important implications for any challenges that traders face due to the COVID-19 crisis. Effects on traders will also be felt upstream by farmers through both their post-harvest crop marketing activities, including the prices they receive for their crops, and potentially through access to agricultural inputs on credit. Furthermore, challenges to crop trading will also have effects on the food system downstream and, ultimately, on consumers. This is the second policy note in a series presenting results from phones surveys tracking a sample of crop traders across Myanmar. The surveys are designed to better understand the effects of COVID-19 shocks on Myanmar’s agri-food marketing system. This Policy Note builds on the results from the first round of the survey of crop traders. 1 This second round of the survey also added questions on two key themes from the first-round report – credit offered out by traders to farmers and trader’s use of mobile phones.Non-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; MAPSA; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural EconomiesDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Monitoring the impact of COVID-19 in Myanmar: Agricultural equipment retailers - November 2020 survey round
No full textAgricultural equipment retailers (ER) play an essential role in meeting the demand from farmers for the provision of a diverse set of machines and equipment at affordable prices which are needed for the heterogeneous agricultural production environments in Myanmar. The business operations of ERs can be particularly sensitive to bottlenecks in trade flows and to internal logistical disruptions that affect their inventory management. Given their close linkages with mechanization service providers, the financial and supply challenges that ERs face can have repercussions on the provision of mechanization services as well.Non-PRIFPRI1; MyanmarSSP; CRP2; MAPSA; 4 Transforming Agricultural and Rural Economies; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food IndustryDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
Food prices, processing, and shocks: Evidence from rice and COVID-19
No full textRice is the staple food for about half of the world's population and mills are the essential processing link between farmers and consumers, making rice milling one of the most important agro-processing sectors globally. This paper assesses changes in rice and paddy prices, and processing margins during the COVID-19 pandemic shock through the lens of rice mills in Myanmar. Our data, collected through telephone surveys with a large number of medium- and large-scale rice millers in September 2020, reveal significant disruptions from the COVID-19 pandemic, including transportation restrictions, employee lay-offs, and reduced operations relative to normal times. However, milling margins, and paddy and rice prices were mostly stable, showing only minor increases compared to 2019. Rice prices increased most for the varieties linked to export markets, though the gains were mostly passed through to farmers as higher paddy prices. Similarly, higher rice prices achieved by modern mills—due to extra processing—were mostly transmitted to producers. Our results also highlight the major importance of byproducts—broken rice and rice bran—sales to overall milling margins as byproduct sales allowed mill operators to sustain negative paddy-to-rice margins.PRIFPRI3; CRP2; 3 Building Inclusive and Efficient Markets, Trade Systems, and Food Industry; MAPSA; MyanmarSSP; ISIDSGD; PIMCGIAR Research Program on Policies, Institutions, and Markets (PIM
