Grains & Oilseeds: Rainfall at harvest leads to wheat quality fears from France to Siberia

• Excessive rainfall has deteriorated wheat quality across major production regions in the Northern Hemisphere. In France, traders are sceptical about meeting milling requirements in major markets such as North Africa due to low test weights and falling number. Combined with lower total availability, export estimates to non-EU countries have been lowered to 4 Mt, down from 10 Mt last year. Similarly, large swathes of growing areas in Russia’s Volga, Ural and Siberian regions have received harmful rainfall close to harvest, raising questions about milling wheat availability from Russia. A lot of the lower quality wheat will be relegated to feed wheat, something that the 2024/25 balance sheet cannot afford.
• Soybean shipments to China remain strong, with line-ups for September and October arrivals already close to 7 Mt each month. Brazil remains the largest supplier followed distantly by Argentina and Uruguay. Shipments from the US currently make less than 0.3 Mt of the line-ups.
• South American farmers are weighing their options as the planting window for their summer crops comes close. Brazil has seen a consistent increase in soybean area as marginal pasture lands far from ports become profitable for farming. Due to lower prices this year, the increase in soybean area should be limited and lower than increases seen in previous years. On the other hand, Argentine farmers are considering planting more soybeans instead of corn due to corn’s susceptibility to corn stunt disease.

Soybean imports to China (Mt)

Source: Kpler

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