February 15, 2012

China sees corn purchase price hike at record level

After the Spring Festival holiday on January 22-28, corn purchase prices at China's northeastern ports have risen rapidly mainly due to supply shortage, according to local news on Monday (Feb 13).

By the end of last week, purchase prices of the crop in Dalian, Jinzhou and Bayuquan ports had stood at RMB2,335-2,350/tonne (US$370.81-$373.19), up RMB35-50/tonne (US$5.56-$7.94) over those before the holiday.

The ports saw slower supply of corn as many farmers in northeastern areas of China, the major corn production base in the country, were more reluctant to sell corn and may keep the remaining stocks till May, the planting season for corn.

Meanwhile, booming demand from traders, coupled with restocking demand from feed enterprises in south China, also helped push up corn prices.

Industry insiders predict that as southern feed mills finish their first round of restocking after the holiday, corn prices are likely to slip back from high levels.

The most actively traded corn futures contract on the Dalian Commodity Exchange has surged by nearly 4% since January 30, the first trading day after the holiday.

The National Bureau of Statistics earlier said that China's corn output reached 191.75 million tonnes in 2011, a jump of 8.2% over last year.