"Domestic prices have fallen by almost 100 per cent and supply is exceeding demand, which was never the case in India before," KJ Mathew, chairman of the Rubber Board at India's ministry of commerce, told Reuters at a rubber producers meeting.

The Association of Natural Rubber Producing Countries (ANRPC) meeting in Kuala Lumpur started on Monday. It will end later on Wednesday.

India produces about 620,000 tonnes of rubber annually, around the same as domestic consumption in the past, he said.

"But now demand is decreasing and prices keep falling. We began to see a small surplus two years ago," he said, without giving the surplus figure.

Prices continued to fall despite the government's effort to intervene in the market and encourage more consumption at home, Mathew said.

The ANRPC groups Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka, India, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia and Vietnam. Indonesia and Vietnam were not present at the meeting.

Malaysia and Thailand are set to leave the International Natural Rubber Organisation (Inro), which groups major producing and consuming countries and acts as a price-stabilising body.

They say Inro was unable to support the market and called for alternative measures to Inro.

India is not a member of Inro but will follow any decision made by ANRPC, Mathew said.

"We are very concerned about falling prices. We will support all measures supporting prices," he said.