07/19/05 Will India import wheat?

07/19/05 Will India import wheat?

Farm and Ranch July 19, 2005 In its July Wheat Outlook the USDA says India may makes its first significant imports of wheat in six years, one million metric tons. However, late last week India's Agriculture Minister ruled out the possibility of wheat imports pointing to good monsoon rains. USDA says excessive rains did more damage than expected. USDA World Outlook Board Chairman Gerry Bange sizes up the crops in traditional U.S. wheat export competing countries. Bange: "In the EU-25 they are having another good year. Looks like they are going to produce close to 128 million tons. Of course last year they produced a phenomenal nearly 137 million tons. So while their production will be down from last year. The conditions are somewhat more mixed this year, but they are still going to have another good crop. We are still looking at Australian production of about 21.5 million tons. The same as we estimated last month. Conditions there appear to be about average so there is no real problem there." Bange says to the north in Manitoba, Canada it has been too wet and that's created problems. Bange: "However if you look at the conditions in Alberta and Saskatchewan what you will see is very good conditions and the crops look like they will do very well. Enough so to offset any problems they are having in Manitoba which accounts for only about 15% or so of Canadian wheat production ." The bottomline for U.S. wheat producers is a forecast for reduced exports and a lower price than this past season. I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.
Previous Report07/18/05 Camelina as a crop for biodiesel
Next Report07/20/05 Research on straw based ethanol