March 14, 2007

 

Ukraine's corn export plummets

 

 

Ukraine exported in the first five months of the current corn marketing year, October 2006-February 2007, 163,000 tonnes of corn, about 10 percent of the amount exported in the corresponding period in the previous marketing year, the national customs authority reported Tuesday (Mar 13).

 

In February corn export was 88,000 tonnes, compared with 1,500 tonnes in January. The largest importers were Belarus 26,300 tonnes, Egypt 25,300 tonnes and Libya 25,100 tonnes.

 

Ukraine's 2006/07 corn export potential is 1.2 million tonnes, but exports have been disrupted by the limitations imposed by the government.

 

The government imposed in October 2006 the export quotas for the 2006-2007 marketing year of 1.106 million tonnes, comprising wheat and rye 3,000 tonnes each, barley 600,000 tonnes and corn 500,000 tonnes.

 

Then the government decided Feb 7 to increase the grain export quota for the current marketing year by 864,000 tonnes.

 

The new extra export quotas were: 606,000 tonnes of barley, 30,000 tonnes of corn and 228,000 tonnes of wheat.

 

The government then announced Feb 21 it had scrapped the existing export quotas for feed grain.

 

The government said it was not ready yet to do the same with the milling grain export quotas.

 

The decision to scrap feed grain export quotas had been drafted by the agriculture ministry and included export quotas for feed corn and barley.