MOSCOW, Russia (Reuters) – Russia may lift its ban on grain exports earlier than 2012 if it revises its cereal supply estimates upward.
Russia was hit by a severe drought last summer and originally imposed the ban from Aug. 15, 2010, to July 1, 2011. However, officials later said the ban could be extended until 2012.
“It looks like the government has started to understand that we may have sufficient grain,” said Andrei Sizov, chief executive officer of agricultural analyst firm SovEcon.
“It does not mean that exports will restart from July 1, but the government may examine the availability of grain not at the end of the year, but much earlier.”
Read Also
Research looks to control flea beetles with RNAi
A Vancouver agri-tech company wants to give canola growers another weapon in the never-ending battle against flea beetles.
Russia had grain stocks of 26.2 million tonnes as of April 1, which was down by 6.7 million tonnes, or 20.4 percent, from a year earlier, according to Rosstat, Russia’s official government statistics office.
However, Sizov said Rosstat data is not wholly reliable because it gives only estimated figures for medium and large farms employing more than 100 people.
“Data for small farms are supplied by regional statistic offices and one can only guess how they make these calculations,” he said.
Sizov said that Rosstat recalculated its estimate for domestic grain consumption in 2010 three times: first up to 77 million tonnes from 73 million and then back down to 72 million.
Rosstat cut consumption to 67 million tonnes from 72 million in 2011.
“Therefore it means that some additional five million tonnes of grain may became available to the market (in 2010-11 crop year).”
Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin recently said Russia must restore its credibility as a grain supplier, but he did not say when the ban may be lifted. Russia’s official 2011 crop forecast is 85 to 90 million tonnes.
The Russian Grain Union industry lobby has said exports could restart if Russia harvested 85 million tonnes.
The lobby has also asked the government to open exports for export-oriented southern regions, which would otherwise be unable to dispose of its huge stocks because of underdeveloped infrastructure.
