Wheat Atlas Blog

Wheat news

Wheat news from around the world - 2014, Week 17

Wheat export price
HRW (Gulf)* steadily increased from US$ 330/t (4/21/2014) to US$ 342/t (4/25/2014).
France Grade 1 (Rouen)** remained more or less stable during the week around US$ 300 /t.
Main reasons for continuously high prices are concerns over a disruption to supplies from Russia and Ukraine and some damage that happen to winter wheat in US grain plains.
**********
World wheat production
The International Grains Council
on April 25 lowered its forecast for 2014-15 world wheat production to 697 million tonnes, down 3 million tonnes from the I.G.C.’s March outlook and down 12 million tonnes, or 2%, from 709 million tonnes in 2013-14. Even with the lower forecast, the 2014-15 world wheat crop was projected to be second in size only to last year’s record outturn. Download IGC report (pdf)

**********
Asia
Unseasonal rain with strong winds across Pakistan and India (Punjab, Haryana, Western UP) has dampened wheat harvesting, sparking fear of losses. How big the losses might be is not yet clear. Read more - Pakistan (1), Pakistan (2), Pakistan (3), India

Wheat procurement in India this year is apparently significantly slower compared to 2013 and government's wheat procurement target for 2014/15 marketing year is likely to be missed and slip bellow last year's level of 25 million tons. Read more - India (1),India (2)
**********
The government's wheat procurement target for the ongoing 2014-15 marketing year is likely to be missed and slip below the last year's level of 25 million tonnes, Food Secretary Sudhir Kumar said today.

South America
Experts in Argentina foresee strong increase (up to 13%) of the wheat area in the next cropping season. One of the conditions of wheat area growth are necessary changes in the current system of wheat trade in Argentina. Read more - Argentina (1)Argentina (2)

Brazil is planning decrease its dependency on wheat imports by increasing wheat acreage. Forecast for 2014/2015 wheat production is up to 6.7 million tons. Wheat area in Brazil during last 5 years is around 2.2 million hectares and wheat production is oscillating between 5 and 6 million tons/year. But acording to EMBRAPA, Brazil could quickly become self-sufficient in wheat production and has potential to produce up to 23 million tons, which is about 4 times more than its current wheat production and almost 3 times more than current wheat production in Argentina. Read more - Brazil (1), Brazil (2)
**********
Australia
All the climate models now show an El Nino pattern is likely this year, with six of the seven global models predicting the threshold will be reached as early as July. Seventy per cent of the El Nino events in the past century have resulted in drought over Australia, affecting wheat production particularly in the east coast. Read more - Australia
**********
Africa
New strain of the stem rust has infected about 10,000 hectares of wheat farms in southern Ethiopia. Scientists fear it could spread to neighbouring countries and the Middle East. Researchers at CIMMYT, the Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research, the US Department for Agriculture’s Cereals Disease Laboratory and the Global Rust Reference Center in Denmark, say the strain is similar to the one detected in Egypt, Germany and Turkey between 2007 and 2013, but where no impact on production was noticed. Read more - Ethiopia

Government of Egypt, the world's largest importer of wheat, is expecting more wheat than ever before from local farmers this year, thanks to the introduction of a new nationwide system of contractual farming. The world’s largest wheat importer is expected to buy 4.25 million tons of local wheat by July this year, almost half of the projected harvest's 9.6 million tons.
On the demand side Egypt will try to save half the money it spends on wheat subsidies by issuing a new smart card system to ensure that the cheap bread goes to only the neediest. Read more - Egypt (1), Egypt (2)

**********
*(US Wheat, Hard Red Winter, Fob US Gulf ports)
**(EU - France Grade 1 Rouen)