September 24, 2010

Russia's spring grain acreage totals 15% less for the decade

Russia's spring grain sowing areas decreased by 15% during the recent 10 years from 33.6 million hectares in 2000 to 28.5 million hectares in the current year.

According to Arkadiy Zlochevskiy, the President of Russian Grain Union, all cases of reduction of grain sowing areas happened due to spring crops sowing areas decrease.

Winter sowing areas changing dynamics is milder - after the decrease to 12 million hectares in 2000 (as opposed to 18.4 million hectares in 1990), to date the index varies within the frames of 15-16 million hectares. It is due to the fact that winter sowings yield is higher by 1.5 times compared with the spring sowings yield.

In the current year, grain sowing areas reduced to the level of 43.6 million hectares (without taking into account perished sowings due to the droughts) as opposed to 47.6 million hectares last year. At the same time, the major decrease almost by 2.5 million hectares happened due to spring grains sowing areas reduction.

Zlochevskiy also paid attention that in the current year wheat sowing areas reduced to the level of 26.7 million hectares as opposed to 28.7 million hectares last year; barley - to the level of seven million hectares as opposed to nine million ha, respectively.

At the same time, corn sowing areas increased to the level of 1.5 million hectares as opposed to 1.4 million hectares last year; sunflower sowing areas increased to the level of 7.2 million hectares as opposed to 6.2 million hectares, respectively.

According to the Head of the Grain Union, crop production in Russia essentially depends on the market conjuncture: if grain prices are high, next year the country should expect for high grain production, and on the contrary. Such legitimacy is clearly noticeable during the last 30 years, the specialists call the schedule where it is displayed as "the price saw", and the weather conditions are also the additional factor.