Thai farmers and farm cooperatives are calling for the government to conduct diplomatic talks with China to solve the increase of non-tariff barriers on Thai fresh food products.
Fresh products from China are also flooding the country via the China-Laos rail way but Thai traders cannot send anything.
“The current situation is the worst its been in 20 years,” Sunchai Puranachaikere, The President of Thai Fresh Fruit Traders and Exporters Association, told Thai Enquirer on Monday.
“There is no need for the government to talk to Thai traders and authorities to find out what is going on anymore, the problems are clear since we have had meetings on this many times before and what they should do is to go talk to China,” he said.
He said Thai products such as Durian and other fruits are rotting at the border because of China’s strict Covid rules which slow down their importation process at Mohan and Youyiguan checkpoints which are the main trade routes for Thai products to China.
The trade to Mohan checkpoint via Loas is disrupted for more than a month now since China shutdown the checkpoint because of Covid while trade from Nakhon Phanom to Youyiguan also dropped from 300-400 containers per day down to 100 per day because of China’s Covid rules.
“Out of the 100 containers going in, maybe 10 are Thais,” he said.
Flooding Thai Markets
China is also able to send goods to Thailand via the recently completed China-Laos high speed railway but Thai exporters cannot use the same route.
“How come they can have a trial period but we cannot?” he asked.
Sunchai was referring to China’s trial run of the trade route and 33 containers of Chinese fresh fruits and vegetables that arrived in Nong Khai last week.
He said the reason the Thai government gave to Thai traders, that the problem is checkpoints in China which are not ready to process Thai products, is “unacceptable”.
“The commerce ministry said the Chinese checkpoints will not be ready until February and this is a huge disadvantage,” he said.
“With the railway, they will be able to send around 50 containers to Thailand per day but we can only send back no more than 30 containers per day,” he said.
Sunchai said China is also increasingly imposing regulations on Thai products but there is no action from the Thai government at all.