Flour exports from Russia in the milling season 2018/19 (August-July) may decline due to high prices, predicts the Institute for Agricultural Market Studies (IKAR). "The export of Russian wheat flour increased last season due to a low price level in the first half of it. The situation may change in the current agricultural year," experts estimate. For 11 months, wheat flour has risen in price by 25%.
In the season 2017/18, the export of wheat flour increased by 34% to 255K tons. The largest buyer of Russian flour is China, which over the past two seasons has increased its share in imports of Russian flour. Following the last agricultural year, deliveries to this country increased to 134K tons against 71K tons in 2016/17 and 37K tons in 2015/16. Thus, the supply of Russian wheat flour to China accounted for 53% of total exports last season, another 9% was supplied to Belarus, 8% to Abkhazia. However, this season Hong Kong will be a clear competitor for China. Hong Kong is becoming more and more confidently a new significant market for Russian wheat flour, IKAR notes. As a result of August-November 2018, China's share fell to 33%, Hong Kong rose to second place (13% against 4% in 2017/18), Abkhazia ranked third (11%).
Along with a decrease in the export of flour this season, a reduction in the export of bran is also possible. At the end of 2017/18, Russian wheat bran exports reached a new record of 860K tons. The status of the main importer has been reserved by Turkey. However, following the results of four months of the current season, a lag in deliveries abroad is predicted.
The margin in the milling industry, as in the past season, is low. According to Rosstat, for 11 months of 2018, wheat flour at the wholesale level went up by 25% to 15,700 RUR per ton ($ 226). Prices have been rising since April, to the level of which they added almost 3,500 RUR / ton ($ 50.38). Bread from wheat flour, according to official statistics, has risen in price from the beginning of the year in retail by 5.6% to 48.7 RUR / kg ($ 0.7).
Source: zol.ru.
