VNBusinessNews – Cashew processing companies want the government to give them interest-free loans so that they can buy up the huge stockpiles of nuts on the growers’ plantations, the Viet Nam Cashew Association said.

VCA Vice Chairman Nguyen Thai Hoc said the growers were sitting on an estimated 30,000 tons of raw cashews for which the industry needed about VND6.7 trillion, or US$383 million, to purchase.

Hoc said the factories were asking the government for zero-interest loans as they could not afford the commercial bank rates, even though these were subsidized by the government to an extent.

“What worries the cashew processors is that they will not have enough for their factories this year if the growers quit planting because of their high stockpiles,” he said.

To help them buy up all the stocks, VCA chairman Nguyen Duc Thanh said, the factories were forming a loose alliance based on the main cashew-growing regions of Binh Phuoc, Dong Nai and Tay Ninh provinces and the Central Highlands.

Thanh said the reason for the buildup was that the factories had curtailed their purchasing as their new export orders had declined sharply.

Cashew exports fell 22% yearon-year to 12,000 tons in 2008, with orders from the all-important US market taking a 30% hit, according to Thanh.

Even so, the General Statistics Office says Vietnam earned $920 million from exporting cashews in 2008, a 40% increase year-on-year. (TN)