Vietnam to pocket $4.5bn from rubber exports in 2013

Vietnam's rubber sector expects to bring home 4.5 billion U.S. dollars from rubber exports in 2013, higher than 4.26 billion dollars recorded in 2012, according to the Vietnam Rubber Association (VRA) on Monday. Rubber now ranks the eighth among the country's top export commodities after garment and textiles, telephones, crude oil, electronics products, footwear, seafood and machinery. In 2012, Vietnam became the fifth biggest natural rubber producer in the world with 910,500 hectare of land under rubber cultivation, producing 836,600 tons of rubber, reported the VRA. The country also ranked the fourth in terms of the amount of natural rubber for export, which accounted for 10.6 percent of the world's market share in 2012. Vietnamese rubber output stands at about 1.7 tons of latex per hectare, worth 105 million VND (4.976 U.S. dollars), ranking the third after India and Thailand, according to the association. In the first nine months of 2013, VRA exported 710,000 tons of rubber, earning 1.68 billion U.S. dollars, a decrease of 1.2 percent in volume and 17.8 percent in value year on year. So far this year in 2013, the average rubber export price reached 2,393 U.S. dollars per ton, down 17.68 percent compared to the same period last year. China is the biggest consumer of Vietnamese rubber exports, accounting for 42.7 percent of the country's total export value, followed by Malaysia with 21.2 percent.