"Virtually all of the decline in world trade has occurred in sailings to Asian markets, which have dropped by nearly 2.4 million tonne during the first nine months of this year," Slayton and Associates, a US -- based research group said in a paper presented at a rice conference on the central Philippine island of Cebu. Physical rice imports in the first nine months of the year were estimated to have reached 17.5 million tonne, down 2.2 million from last year. Slayton said it expected Asian imports to decline 29.4 per cent or four million tonne this year from a total of 13.6 million in 1998.

Indonesia and the Philippines bought record volumes last year due to crop losses from the El Nino weather pattern. Bangladesh was forced to import because of damage from a major flooding. "Despite a mediocre 1999 crop resulting from pests and lower input usage, we expect that imports by Indonesia will decline by two million tonne from last year's unprecedented six million." It also projected Philippine rice imports to drop to 9,00,000 tonne this year from the previous year's 2.1 million while Bangladesh was forecast to import 1.7 million tonne this year from 2.5 million in 1998.

"This year's plunge in purchase from Indonesia and the Philippines has only been partially moderated by stepped up sailings to Africa and the Middle East," Slayton said. Africa, Middle-East imports seen up Africa will probably import 5.25 million tonne this year, or 4,75,000 tonne over last year's volume. "Propelled by stepped up shipments of parboiled and broken.

African imports during January-September are estimated to exceed four million tonne--4,00,000 tonne ahead of last year's numbers," Slayton said. Imports into the Middle East are expected to reach 3.8 million tonne, or 4,75,000 more than last year when low oil prices and high rice prices crimped regional imports. Latin America may import less than the record 3.4 million tonne it bought in 1998. "We (tallied) regional arrivals through September at 1.9 million tonne, a decline of over 0.4 million tonne from the first nine months of 1998 due to drastically reduced imports by Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Peru," Slayton said. India, China lead lower exports With slower demand, India and China are expected to register the largest decline in export sales. India is forecast to ship 2.85 million tonne this year, against a record 5.3 million last year. China's exports were forecast to fall 20 per cent from last year's record shipments of 3.11 million.

Thailand's exports may drop 3,00,000 tonne this year to 6.1 million tonne while Pakistan's exports were seen slipping to 1.7 million tonne from the previous 1.8 million. Vietnam is forecast to export a record 4.25 million this year from 3.774 million tonne in 1998.