September 15, 2011

Ukraine's grain production forecast revised up

Due to Ukraine's increase in corn harvest, analyst UkrAgroConsult raised its 2011 grain harvest forecast to 46.793 million tonnes from previous forecast of 46.258 million.

The analyst said in a report it had upgraded the 2011 corn crop forecast to 15.5 million tonnes as of September from the forecast of 15.0 million in August.

It increased the corn yield forecast to 4.56 tonnes per hectare from 4.41 tonnes a month earlier.

The consultancy left unchanged its estimates for Ukraine's wheat and barley harvests.

It said the ex-Soviet republic was likely to harvest 20.6 million tonnes of wheat and 8.3 million tonnes of barley this year.

According to the Agriculture Ministry, 23.2 million tonnes of wheat and 9.48 million of barley in gross weight have been harvested in Ukraine. Nevertheless, UkrAgroConsult left its estimates at 20.6 million tonnes for wheat and 8.3 million for barley in clean weight, the consultancy said.

Ukraine's Farm Minister Mykola Prysyazhnyuk told Reuters this month the grain harvest in clean weight would be no less than 51 million tonnes, including 22.2 million of wheat.

The ministry also forecast the record corn harvest at up to 20 million tonnes in Ukraine this year. In 2010, the harvest totalled 11.9 million tonnes.

In 2010, Ukraine harvested 39.2 million tonnes of grain, including 16.8 million of wheat.

Ukraine consumes about 26 million tonnes of grain per year and the Farm Ministry said the grain exports could jump to 24 million tonnes in the 2011/12 season from 12.7 million in 2010/11.