JAPAN, March 19, 2004 -- Japan has prepared a list of 38 food additives to be withdrawn from its approved list of food additives and is seeking comments on the proposed withdrawals.

MALAYSIA, March 19, 2004 -- No summary available.

MALAYSIA, March 19, 2004 -- No summary available.

MALAYSIA, March 19, 2004 -- No summary available.

THAILAND, March 19, 2004 -- Thailand is Southeast Asia's second largest economy and its economy has shown remarkable improvement with forecast growth of 9 percent for year 2004. Thailand imported $80 million in consumer oriented foods from the U.S. in 2002, up 22 percent over 2001's $65 million. The HRI food service sector comprises approximately 150,000 outlets including some 100,000 restaurants and more than 5,000 hotels and resorts. Thai consumer expenditure on food at all food service outlets was estimated to be $5.7 billion in 2001.

MALAYSIA, March 19, 2004 -- A sharp drop in domestic demand for soybean meal resulted in a 25% plunge in soybean imports to 554 TMT and a 14% drop in soymeal imports in 2002/03. The U.S. replaced Argentina as the top soybean supplier to the Malaysian soybean import market. The outlook for 2003/04 is brighter. Malaysia's intake of U.S. soybean is expected to increase by 18% to 240 TMT. Malaysia led the world as the largest producer of palm oil in 2002/03. CPO production is expected to increase to 13.7 MMT in 2003/04 with exportable surplus of over 12.2 MMT.

PHILIPPINES, March 19, 2004 -- On March 4, 2004, the President of the Philippines issued Executive Order No. 295 (EO 295) which reclassified some sugar containing products from H.S. 2106.90.10 and 2106.90.50 to 1701.91.00 and 1701.99.00. Under the new headings, the applied tariffs for these products will increase from 1-10 percent to between 48-65 percent. According to the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA), EO 295 was designed to effectively close the loophole used by domestic beverage manufacturers to bring in raw materials at low tariffs.

VIETNAM, March 19, 2004 -- Vietnam rice exporters and Government authorities are struggling to balance their export and domestic need in a market, which appears to have a shortage of export-quality rice to fulfill signed contracts. Reportedly, rice stocks are also flowing, in increasing amounts, across the border to China.

PHILIPPINES, March 19, 2004 -- On March 9, 2004, the Philippine Department of Agriculture (DA) through Memorandum No. 15 temporarily banned poultry imports from the State of Maryland due to a confirmed outbreak of avian influenza in the state. The order became effective on February 15, 2004

THAILAND, March 19, 2004 -- Export prices continued to increase to five-year height, due to aggressive export demand and limited local supply.

EUROPEAN UNION, March 19, 2004 -- This weekly report contains data on rice prices in the U.S., Thailand and the EU. It also lists current import duties and export subsidies in the EU. All information will be published as such in the USDA publication "Rice Market News".

SAUDI ARABIA, March 19, 2004 -- On March 13, 2004, the Saudi Government (MOA) imposed a ban on the importation of live U.S. birds, day-old-chickens and hatching eggs out of fear that they might be infected with the bird influenza (Avian).

AUSTRIA, March 19, 2004 -- Austrian consumers are one of the leading opponents to green biotechnology. The majority of Austrians prefer no biotech products in agriculture and food because they believe that genetically modified food carries an incalculable risk for future generations and that the natural order is at risk. Given recent unfortunate European experiences with food disasters, the Austrian consumers have no trust in food safety and biotech legislation.