BANGKOK - RECENT flooding has damaged around 470,000 tonnes of paddy from Thailand's main crop, a senior agricultural official said on Thursday.

'Floods hit rice fields in the north and the northeastern regions and destroyed around 2 per cent of our main rice crop, which equates to around 470,000 tonnes of paddy,' Mr Apichart Jongskul, secretary-general of the agricultural economics office in the Agriculture Ministry, told Reuters.

Thailand is expecting 23.8 million tonnes of paddy from its main crop, harvesting in November, according to ministry data.

However, traders said a drop in supply of this size was unlikely to have much of an impact on prices.

'The key problem pushing rice prices lower is falling demand,' one exporter said.

Benchmark 100 percent B grade white rice fell to US$530 (S$802) per tonne on Wednesday, down from last week's US$550, and is now less than half its record high of US$1,080 per tonne in April.

The price was expected to fall further over the next few weeks due to increasing supply as the government is about to release 2.5 million tonnes of rice from its stocks after a tender last week to sell 3.1 million tonnes. -- REUTERS