August 23, 2011

Kazakhstan's grain export potential to increase

Kazakhstan hopes to raise its grain export potential by approximately 70% in the present marketing year based on a bigger production, according to the country's agriculture minister, Asylzhan Mamytbekov, on Monday (Aug 22).

"Our export potential, I think, will be more than 10 million tonnes of grain," Mamytbekov said, referring to the crop marketing year that runs from July 1, 2011 to June 30, 2012.

Kazakhstan, traditionally among the world's top 10 wheat exporters, shipped 5.9 million tonnes of wheat and flour in the 2010/11 marketing year, down from 8.4 million tonnes in the previous 12 months.

The minister's latest forecast is bolder than his previous estimate that this season's exports would match or exceed the amount shipped in 2010/2011.

Mamytbekov had earlier told a government meeting that he expected Kazakhstan's 2011 grain harvest to reach up to 18.9 million tonnes.

He did not specify whether this would be clean weight or bunker weight, but said it would include 14.5 million tonnes of wheat.

Kazakhstan's drought-affected grain crop in 2010 was 12.2 million tonnes by clean weight, down from the record 20.8 million tonnes harvested the previous year.