February 14, 2011

Kazakhstan's grain stocks slump below nine million tonnes

Kazakhstan gained only 8.645 million tonnes of grains supplies on February 1, down 7.4% on-month from 9.334 million tonnes, the national statistics agency reported Friday (Feb 11).

Milling grain stocks fell by 8.6% on the month to 6.247 million tonnes from 6.828 million tonnes on January 1. Stocks of grain for seed remained practically the same at 1.845 million tonnes. The feed grain stocks fell the largest amount, by 15.5% to 552,361 tonnes.

The Kazakh-Grain market analyst said in a report Friday (Feb 11) that at the present rate of consumption of feed grain, the current stocks were unlikely to last until the beginning of the next marketing year July 1. He said farmers would have to rely on fresh grass, given it appeared in April, or use milling grain for animal feed.

Kazakhstan harvested in 2010 just over 14 million tonnes of grain, down from the 20 million tonnes harvested in 2009. The agriculture ministry said at the end of 2010 Kazakhstan would have enough grain for domestic consumption in the current marketing year and, taking into account the grain left over from last year, the country would have an export potential of seven million to eight million tonnes.

Currently there are no government-imposed curbs on grain export in Kazakhstan.