May 7 (Bloomberg) -- Rice surged for a fourth day on speculation that Myanmar may be transformed from a net exporter to a buyer on the international market after last weekend's cyclone damaged crops and left as many as 60,000 people dead or missing.
Rice for July delivery rose as much as 50 cents, or 2.4 percent, to $21.60 per 100 pounds on the Chicago Board of Trade. Weekly prices from Thailand, the world's biggest exporter, are set to be released later today by the country's main exporters group.
Cyclone Nargis struck the main rice-growing area of Myanmar, worsening a food crisis that threatens as many as 1 billion Asians. The staple food for half the world has almost doubled in the past year, stoking protests and poverty from Haiti to the Philippines.
``The cyclone damage in Myanmar will further tighten rice supplies, especially in Asia'' Takaki Shigemoto, an analyst at Tokyo-based commodity broker Okachi & Co., said today by phone. ``This may drive importers to rush for supplies as the cyclone has made the rice exporter rely on food aid.''
Before the storm, the Food and Agriculture Organization had estimated that Myanmar may have exported 600,000 metric tons of rice this year, with shipments set for Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. That compares with estimated global exports this year of 29.9 million tons, according the Rome-based United Nations agency.
The most-active Chicago contract, which traded limit-up at $21.60 per 100 pounds at 11:48 a.m. Singapore time, has gained as much as 4.7 percent in the past four days.
Death Toll
State television said 22,000 people died and more than 40,000 were missing, the UN's IRIN news agency reported. Myanmar has a population of about 48 million people.
Surging food prices are hurting 1 billion Asians as the poor struggle to cope with rising costs, Asian Development Bank President Haruhiko Kuroda said on May 5. The World Food Program warned last month of a ``silent famine'' in Asia and Africa as the price of basic foods rose beyond people's reach.
The storm whipped up a 12-foot (3.66 meter) wave that inundated low-lying regions of the Irrawaddy delta, Ken Reeves, director of forecasting operations for AccuWeather.com, said in a statement. ``Sea-water reached 10 miles (16 kilometers) inland.''
The delta ``is the country's main rice-growing region,'' John Sparrow, a spokesman for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies, said in a statement dated yesterday. ``Roughly 24 million people live there.''
`Further Tightening'
Myanmar's rice-output estimate may be cut because of the crop damage, according to an e-mail from Concepcion Calpe, a senior economist at the Food and Agriculture Organization. A drop in exports from Myanmar or increased imports to the nation would lead to ``further tightening'' of the world rice market, Calpe wrote.
Estimates differ for Myanmar's pre-storm rice production. The Food and Agriculture Organization has forecast output of 18.9 million tons of milled rice in the crop year to Oct. 31. The U.S. Department of Agriculture forecast production of 11.3 million tons.
The Philippines, the world's biggest rice importer, canceled a tender for 675,000 tons of rice this week because of a lack of offers. The government said it may seek fresh supplies in the second half when prices may have declined.
``Rice in Chicago now is driven by speculation,'' Sompong Kitireanglarp, president of Longlarp Ltd., Thailand's third- biggest rice exporter, said by phone in Bangkok.
The damage from the cyclone was ``huge'' and Myanmar may be forced to seek imports of rice, Chookiat Ophaswongse, the president of the Thai Rice Exporters Association, said yesterday.
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