July 7, 2010

Generous government wheat purchases may have limited the collapse in Syria's wheat production due to a virulent fungal infection, by encouraging farmers to harvest even low-yielding, disease-hit fields.

Syria's farm ministry has estimated the wheat harvest at 3.3 million tonnes, down 30% from earlier estimates, after a new strain of yellow rust devastated crops, affecting also parts of Iran, Iraq, Lebanon and Turkey.

However, USDA officials have said that the harvest may have remained above worst expectations thanks to purchases by the state's General Establishment for Cereal Processing and Trade, or Hoboob, which has been offering twice international prices for wheat.

They estimated the crop at 3.6 million tonnes, down some 12% on-year, if falling well short of the record harvest that was expected before the rust epidemic struck.

But the subsidies are expensive for a country which is considerably poorer than the oil-rich parts of the Middle East, besides its immediate neighbours Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey.

Other problems which have beset Syria's crop include a late March frost, and dry weather which has started fire in some wheat fields, further entrenching the reliance on imports of a country which was an exporter until three years ago.

However, it is the rust outbreak which has gained most attention internationally, given that it coincides with the spread of the Ug99 rust variety through Africa.

Since being identified in Uganda in 1999, it has spread into east African countries including Ethiopia and Kenya, and has been detected as far as South Africa.