The Russians Are At It Again - Current Grain Crop Well Understated
Following the lead from their cheeky Ukrainian neighbours Russia said Tuesday that their grain harvest was 65% complete at 84mmt, and that they expect this season's total output to be 95mmt, up 13mmt from 2007's 82mmt.
No stranger to subterfuge, the Russians only recently upped their 2008 output estimate up from 85mmt, a figure they have now virtually achieved with a third of the crop still to harvest!
Now you may recall that the Ukraine all the way through the growing season were consistently putting out substantially lower production forecasts than they in fact delivered.
It seems that Russia must have got their calculators from the same shop.
84mmt off 65% of your acreage gives you a final output of 129mmt not 95mmt. OK I'm assuming here that all the best land hasn't been harvested first and that yields on the remaining 35% will come in similar to those already harvested.
What I can tell you though is that for the Russian crop to "only" be 95mmt then the remaining 35% of unharvested land would have to yield just 1.5mt/hectare compared to the average so far this harvest of 2.79mt/hectare. Seems unlikely doesn't it?
The final Russian harvest looks like being well in excess of 100mmt you mark my words.
Russian Grain Harvest Now Seen In Excess Of 100MMT
This season's Russian grain crop is now seen in excess of 100mmt, significantly higher than recent official estimates of 85mmt according to comments late Friday from Agriculture Minister Nikolai Arkhipov.
Russia has already harvested 92mmt so far this year, Arkhipov said, significantly higher than the 82mmt harvested last year.
Russia Set To Increase '08 Grain Output Estimate
Well, we didn't see that one coming did we? As mentioned on here recently the figures coming out of Russia didn't add up. Just like the Ukraine crop this is one that's going to keep getting bigger methinks. This is translated from Russian so excuse the slight pigeon English. This won't be the last of the increases you mark my words....
Ministry of Agriculture of Russia will increase grains and grain legumes croppage forecast after August 20 this year.
Earlier Ministry forecasted 85 mln tonnes of grains crop, but now forecast will grow, declared Aleksey Gordeev, Minister of Agriculture, on August, 8.
New grains forecast of Ministry of Agriculture will total 88-90 mln tonnes, reported market participants, but officials haven't confirmed the figures yet.
Russian grain crop could be substantially larger than official estimates
Russia has harvested 41.8 million metric tons of grain to August 4 on 11.9 million hectares, or 25% of the total planted area the agriculture ministry reported Tuesday.
The agriculture ministry said it expected this year's grain harvest at 85 million tons in clean weight, three million tons more than in 2007.
Get the calculators out. They've got nearly half the anticipated output off 25% of the planted area. I'm getting deja vu here. Didn't we have a similar situation with Ukraine recently? Didn't the Ukraine crop keep getting bigger & bigger as they got through the harvest, showing initial projections to have been somewhat "cautious"? They wouldn't be trying to avoid a collapse in grain prices by telling the world exactly how much grain they have to sell would they? What, the Russians, lying? Naked in a girls dormitory at 3 am?
Russia to increase grain export in 2008, 9.3MMT carryover from 2007
In 2008 Russia has significant opportunities to increase grain export volumes, reported Stanislaw Aleinik, the Deputy Minister of Agriculture of Russia, on July, 23.
According to S. Aleinik, the majority of Russian regions have already started the harvesting campaign, and to date yield exceed last year's levels. The country has already harvested 24 mln tonnes of grain (bunker weight) and the expected harvest in clean weight will total 85 mln tonnes of grain, he said.
The Ministry plans to export 14-15 mln tonnes of grain in 2008. Also Russia has in storage nearly 9.3 mln tonnes of wheat, barley and oats that remained from last year crop, added S. Aleinik.
Russian areas with grain crops grow to 47.2 million hectares in 2008
(Interfax News Agency) -- Russia increased the area for grain crops by 2.3 million hectares (5.2%) to 47.2 million hectares in 2008, the State Statistics Service said this week.
Wheat was sown on 2.2 million additional hectares, the service said. Seventy-six percent of all grain crops were sown by public farms, and the share of private farmers enlarged to 23% as against 22.5% last year.
Areas for sunflower increased by 16.8% to 6.2 million hectares.
Public farms sowed 64.7% of sunflower, while private farms sowed 34.9%, as against 34.8% last year.
Sugar beet was sown on 0.8 million hectares or 22.7% less than last year. Public farms sowed 87.9% of sugar beat, and private farms sowed 11% (as against 13.3% last year).
Potatoes were planted on 2.1 million hectares (1.6% more than last year) and vegetables - on 0.6 million hectares (2.2%). Most of the potatoes and vegetables (1.8 million hectares and 476,000 hectares correspondingly) were planted by private farmers.
The Russian Agriculture Ministry said that Russia may collect over 85 million tonnes of grain in 2008 as against 81.8 million in 2007.
