The Valencian Association of Farmers (AVA-Asaja) has once again put the focus on the “ruin” situation facing the rice sector and has warned that, “if political parties do not act quickly before farmers face the first expenses of the next campaign, it will convene a large-scale sector meeting on rice with all the delegations in order to push for more forceful pressure actions at all levels, including mobilizations.”
At an extraordinary general assembly of the local delegation of Sueca (Valencia) of AVA-Asaja—whose attendees account for more than 70% of the rice production of the municipal district—the “limit situation” experienced by producers was analyzed, and “aid measures with an urgent nature to save the crop and the Albufera natural park” were demanded.
During the meeting, the “record increase” in rice purchases from third countries was put on the table, especially from Southeast Asia and Mercosur, which, sheltered by the trade treaty signed in 2026, have sent to the EU in just two months the volume that was expected for an entire year, according to AVA-Asaja in a statement.
The farming organization warns that this wave of imports is overwhelming the market, generating large stocks of rice with no commercial outlet and, even, “some cooperatives fear being unable to sell their stored harvest until the next harvest comes around.”
In addition to the collection of the current campaign, 270,000 tons of surplus rice from the previous year remain in storage facilities, including batches imported before 2026, according to the association. The sector calculates that, without counting any new entries of foreign rice, and with annual consumption in Spain of around 550,000 tons, when the 2026/27 campaign ends the surplus could rise to 320,000 tons, to which all imports arriving during the season would be added.
With prices at origin sunk to 0.31 euro/kg—compared with 0.70 euro/kg four years ago and clearly below rising production costs and the subsidies of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP)—the outlook for the next campaign are, in the sector’s view, even more negative.
Pests and decline in productivity
The rice growers of AVA-Asaja have also denounced an “alarming drop in productivity due to the lack of effective solutions” in the face of pyricularia and the 'cucat', pests that this year have caused losses of up to 35% in many rice fields.
The losses associated with these plant-health problems are estimated this campaign at 150 euros per hanegada, a level that many producers, both from small and large holdings, consider unmanageable and that has led them to decide not to sow in 2027.
AVA-Asaja demands on the Generalitat and the Government
The president of AVA-Asaja, Cristóbal Aguado, has asked for an urgent meeting with the president of the Generalitat, Juanfran Pérez Llorca, and with the Agriculture minister, Miguel Barrachina, and the Environment minister, Vicente Martínez Mus, with the aim of agreeing on immediate responses that halt this situation of ruin.
At the same time, he has called for the involvement of the central Government in “the ineffectiveness of the Ministry of Agriculture and the intransigence of the Ministry for the Ecological Transition, both in plant-health matters and in direct aid”.
The agricultural leader has stressed that “if this meeting is not held with speed and if political parties do not make moves in Valencia, Madrid and Brussels, we will raise the level of our discontent and we will not rule out going out on the street. We cannot endure more losses while the vampires of the rice sector and politics are ruining rice and the Albufera”.
Among the measures being proposed, AVA-Asaja is requesting exceptional aid from the Generalitat co-financed by the central Government and the European Union, the immediate activation of the safeguard clause against imports from third countries — as was already done in 2019 — and the withdrawal of rice from the market to allocate it for non-food uses, in order to reduce the surplus and favor a recovery of prices at the source.
The association is in favor of commercial agreements “but only to complement European production, not to replace it as is happening with rice”. Along these lines, it demands that these treaties incorporate reciprocity in plant-health, fiscal, labor and environmental matters.
Risk for the Albufera and additional requests
AVA-Asaja has warned, in addition, of "the limitations that Valencia rice growers suffer for being within a natural park, where they have no option to change crops." "The only alternative is abandonment with the serious consequences that this can have for the park and for the Albufera lake," the organization has pointed out.
Among the demands addressed at the assembly are the hiring of more research staff at the Ivia specialized in rice, the streamlining of the use of new genomic techniques (Crisper) to develop varieties resistant to weeds and diseases, as well as a plan for the restructuring of plots and for shared cultivation that allows gaining competitiveness and efficiency.
"The protests by the rice growers of Sueca add to those carried out this same week in Silla and Alfafar, where many farmers threaten to stop sowing in the next campaign, with the serious repercussions this would imply for the environmental conservation of the natural park of the Albufera," the association has explained.