Australia's farmers in the east of the continent are securing wheat seeds long before field work for the winter crops begins, hoping that the three-year drought will finally end.
For the first time in years, the fields there are green again and the forecast for the next grain harvest of the world's seventh largest wheat exporter has already been raised. Even if winter crops are only sown in Australia in April and May, the demand for the seeds is now very high. One wonders now how large the acreage will be. Should rain still fall at the end of April, the conditions in the states of Queensland and New South Wales would be ideal for the next grain season.
Australian wheat production fell to a 12-year low last year at 15.2 million tons. The government's commodity expert is now assuming that the next wheat harvest down there will be 40% larger, which would be 21.3 million tons. Private market analysts even expect up to 28 million tons. That would be almost twice as much as last.
In 2016, before the three-year drought, Australia was the fourth largest wheat exporter in the world. In the meantime, however, the Black Sea region supplies customers in Asia and competition on the world market has increased.
Source
HANSA Terminhandel
