Ukraine’s 2021-22 wheat exports up 21% on year, prices fall after record high

Ukraine’s wheat exports were nearly 21% higher year on year at 14.6 million mt from July 1, the start of the marketing year 2021-22, through Dec. 6, data released Dec. 7 by the country’s agricultural ministry showed.

However, the pace of exports slowed as the on year gap slightly narrowed from over 22% at the end of the week to Nov. 29 to 21% now.

Due to rising demand, export prices of Ukrainian wheat have risen around 3-5% over the past month. However, demand has waned slightly over the past week as prices peaked, traders said.

Traders anticipate wheat prices to soften further in the near term as Middle Eastern nations are moving to other sources, like Brazil and Argentina, to buy the food grain.

“The pace of exports declined as prices peaked last week and demand has been hit slightly,” said a Kyiv-based trader.

According to S&P Global Platts assessments, FOB prices of 11.5% protein wheat fell to $335.25/mt from the all-time high of $342.25/mt on Nov. 29.

Ukraine’s wheat exports have been increasing sharply since August as Russia, the largest wheat exporter, hiked its export duty on wheat and tightened global supply, traders said.

S&P Global Platts Analytics projected Ukraine to export 22.5 million mt of wheat in MY 2021-22, while the US Department of Agriculture pegged the country’s wheat exports at 24 million mt in its latest World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates released Nov. 9.

In MY 2020-21, Ukraine shipped out 16.6 million mt of wheat.

Crop progress

According to the Ukrainian agriculture ministry, farmers in Ukraine have sown winter wheat across 6.2 million hectares for MY 2022-23, accounting for nearly 94% of the forecast area of 6.7 million hectares, as of Dec. 7.

The wheat planting has completed in Vinnytsia, Volyn, Transcarpathian, Zhytomyr, Ivano-Frankivsk, Poltava, Sumy, Luhansk, Rivne, and Ternopil, Khmelnytsky, Cherkasy and Chernivsti provinces, it added.

In MY 2021-22, Ukraine harvested around 33 million mt of wheat, up from 25.4 million mt in MY 2020-21, according to the ministry’s statement.

Platts Analytics has projected Ukraine’s wheat production at 31.2 million mt for the current July-June marketing year.

The USDA has pegged Ukraine’s wheat output for the year at 33 million mt, up from 25.4 million mt in MY 2020-21.

S&P Global Platts

Tags: Ukraine, export, grain, prices, wheat