Nogger's Blog

26/04/11 -- May London wheat closed GBP2.00/tonne higher at GBP212.00/tonne with new crop Nov up GBP2.60 to GBP180.00/tonne. May Paris wheat was up EUR1.25/tonne at EUR253.50/tonne whilst Nov was EUR4.25/tonne higher to EUR229.00/tonne.

There were 62,900 MT of original first day wheat tenders against the May contract in London today, with 43,100 MT of re-tendered wheat, my chums at EuropeanGrain.com tell me.

Weekend rains in Europe, such as they were, proved to be fairly scattered across parts of northern France, Germany and Poland leaving crops there already potentially facing yield losses despite the fact that April isn't even out yet.

Potentially of more concern is the 14-day forecast for continued dryness. Some crops here in the UK too could also start to suffer possible significant damage by then too.

Meanwhile the late arrival of spring for Russian growers means that spring plantings there are well behind schedule, and farmers here you will recall are looking to increase their 2011 sowings to make up for a pretty disastrous autumn campaign.

Fast forward across the pond and we find US spring wheat plantings at only 6% complete against 25% normally and 40% of the winter wheat crop rated poor/very poor.

On a more optimistic note Canadian farmers are hoping to plant 17% more wheat for the 2011 harvest, according to Stats Canada today. Conditions will have to warm up and dry up considerably, and fairly rapidly too, for that to happen.