IKAR in Mass and Industry Media

Russian wheat prices rise for fourth week

Dailymail.co.uk

MOSCOW, Aug 22 (Reuters) - Russian wheat export prices rose for a fourth straight week as farmers continued to hold onto their top quality produce, anticipating further price increases after weather-related shortfalls in Europe, analysts said on Monday.

Black Sea prices for Russian wheat with 12.5 percent protein content were $170 a tonne on a free-on-board (FOB) basis at the end of last week, up $2 from a week earlier, Russian agricultural consultancy IKAR said.

SovEcon quoted FOB wheat prices in the Black Sea area at $175 per tonne, up $4.5 from a week earlier.

"We are still expecting sales to accelerate in the majority of regions," SovEcon said in a note, adding that farmers would need to start selling wheat because they need cash to repay short-term debt and finance sowing of winter grains.

There was also a lack of storage capacity in a few regions, SovEcon said.

Russia's Agriculture Ministry expects the crop to be no less than 110 million tonnes, up 2 million tonnes from the previous record set in 2008. It could raise the estimate by 3-6 million tonnes if the weather remains favourable.

It forecasts grains exports of up to 40 million tonnes in the 2016-2017 marketing year, which started on July 1, including 25-30 million tonnes of wheat.

The country exported 3.6 million tonnes of grains, including 3 million tonnes of wheat, between July 1 and Aug. 17, the agriculture ministry said. Grain exports were down 4 percent year on year.

Domestic wheat prices rose 75 roubles last week, from the previous week, to 9,675 roubles ($150) a tonne in the European part of Russia on an ex-works basis, according to SovEcon. Ex-works supply does not include delivery costs.

IKAR's white sugar price index for southern Russia fell $34 last week to $577.5 a tonne at the end of the week. ($1 = 64.7200 roubles) (Reporting by Polina Devitt; Editing by Susan Fenton)

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-3753301/Russian-wheat-prices-rise-fourth-week.html#ixzz4I8j7F0dH

23.08.16

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