World Food Programme Contract Boxes Up Vietnamese Rice
by Victoria Roberts

Container transport has beaten bulk to gain a World Food Programme (WFP) contract to transport about 150 TEU of rice to West Africa and East Timor.

This year's tender for the nearly 3,000 tonnes of Vietnamese rice for East Timor, Cameroon, Gambia and Mauritania was won by forwarder The Freight Company (TFC), which has a Vietnam operation.

Competitive bidding takes place between container and bulk transportation, and box-transport won on this occasion, Gary Cearley, of freight forwarders' association Advanced International Network, representing some 200 forwarders, told ci-online.

The 3,000 tonnes are worth about 150 TEU, he added.

The rice will be shipped out of Ho Chi Minh City port between late July and throughout most of August, according to Torbjoern Larisch, of TFC.

Norway, Luxembourg and Japan were the donors who paid for the rice.

In 2004, Vietnam exported 76,032 tonnes of rice to Cameroon, East Timor, Iraq, Russia and Yemen under the programme.

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