French Exports Well Down On Year Ago

Posted by Nogger - a legend in his own mind at 09:30 | Categorized as

08/09/16 -- EU grains closed mixed. Customs data suggests French exports are well down on year ago levels.

At the close Nov 16 London wheat was up GBP0.25/tonne at GBP122.00/tonne, soon to expire Sep 16 Paris wheat was EUR3.00/tonne lower to EUR145.25/tonne, although other months were mostly fractions of a euro higher. Nov 16 Paris corn was up EUR0.25/tonne at EUR161.250/tonne, Nov 16 Paris rapeseed was EUR2.25/tonne lower at EUR377.00/tonne.

The HGCA reported the UK wheat harvest at 90% complete, with yields averaging 7.8-8.0 MT/ha, in line with the 5-year average 7.9 MT/ha.

"Quality of winter wheat crops this season tended to be good. There were rare reports of samples with discoloured or small grains and ergot in which led to penalties at intake, but these loads are in the minority," they said.

Spring wheat is 60% harvested and spring barley 70% done. Winter OSR harvesting is over with yields only averaging 3.0-3.2 MT/ha versus the 5-year average of 3.6 MT/ha.

Customs data shows that Brussels released 521 TMT worth of soft wheat export licences this past week, taking the season to date total to 5.1 MMT.

French soft wheat exports in July were down 14% at 1.1 MMT, with exports to non-EU destinations of 652 TMT (-5%) and those within the EU at 432 TMT (-24%). Top home was Algeria with 290.5 TMT, although this was down 32% versus July 2015. India also took 108 TMT.

French barley exports in July were down 24% at 715 TMT (China took 259 TMT of that total).

Media reports suggest that the leading French export hub of Rouen exported no grains at all for the week ended Sep 7.

By contrast, Russia said that their Jan/Jul wheat exports were 10.9 MMT, up 60% versus 6.8 MMT a year previously.

Ukraine's 2016 grain harvest was forecast at 63.5 MMT by APK Inform, up 3 MMT on a year ago and only just short of the record 63.9 MMT produced in 2014/15.

Winter rapeseed plantings in Ukraine are reported complete on 601k ha, 54% more than this time a year ago. Final plantings are estimated at 724k ha, up 10% on a year ago.