Australian wheat stocks reach 20.8 million tonnes in February

The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) reported on March 12 that at the start of February 2010, an estimated 20.8 million tonnes of wheat was held in stock in Australia.

Of this amount, roughly 17 million tonnes of wheat was stored by the bulk grain handlers with roughly 13.8 million tonnes of milling quality. The amount of feed grade wheat stored increased by 759,000 tonnes to about 3.2 million tonnes, in the beginning of February 2010.

Wheat stored by the bulk grain handlers fell by 744,000 tonnes to 17 million tonnes at the start of February 2010, after increasing by 7.7 million tonnes in January. ABARE attributed the decline in part to the significant inflow of the current season crop in December 2009 and the increased export volumes in January 2010. Wheat stored by bulk grain handlers fell in all states except Victoria and South Australia, the agency said.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) Wheat Use Survey coverage changed in December 2009 to include wheat use and stocks of wheat held by dairy operators and wheat growers in addition to agricultural and manufacturing businesses.

As a result, data on opening stocks held by wheat users (from January 2010), domestic wheat use (from December 2009) and wheat committed for domestic use (from December 2009) are not directly comparable with previous data, ABARE said.

Based on the broader coverage of the ABS survey, 525,500 tonnes of wheat were used domestically in January 2010. Roughly 3.7 million tonnes of wheat were stored by wheat users at the start of February 2010, according to ABARE.

Wheat committed for domestic use was roughly 1.7 million tonnes in January 2010, according to the agency.

ABARE reported that wheat exports increased by 316,800 tonnes in January 2010 to around 1.4 million tonnes, compared with the 1.1 million tonnes shipped in December 2009. Exports increased from all states with the exception of Queensland, reflecting the greater wheat availability following harvest in December 2009.

Wheat committed for export increased to around 3.3 million tonnes in January 2010 compared to roughly 1.7 million tonnes in January.