Field pea prices jumped last week after news broke that dioxin-contaminated feed made from animal byproducts had contaminated some European dairy, poultry and meat products.
But one market-watcher was skeptical this could have a serious impact on pea prices.
“It doesn’t take much upward price movement for peas to become noncompetitive with barley and oats,” said Brian Clancey of Stat Publishing.
The situation can only be beneficial for peas if the entire feed complex moved up in price, he said.
Alberta Agriculture reported in a commentary last week that France’s agriculture minister was proposing a complete ban on meat and bone meal use in animal feed formulations.
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France consumes about 700,000 tonnes per year of feed meals made with animal byproducts.
If animal byproducts were eliminated, they would be replaced with vegetable protein such as soybean and pea meal.
Futures markets for soybean meal reacted by moving upward, but Clancey said the United States Department of Agriculture’s predicted price for soybean meal is still “pretty crappy,” noting its $140 (U.S.) per tonne price compares poorly with the $223 in March 1997.
There is no way peas could capture 100 percent of any market opportunity that would result from a potential animal-meal ban, he said.
What is more likely to drive the price of peas is human consumption in places such as India.
In any event, with the market starting to think that weather will reduce the quality of the Canadian pea crop, increased demand in Europe for feed peas would be welcome, he said.
The August field pea contract on the Winnipeg Commodity Exchange closed June 14 at $135.60 per tonne, while the June contract closed at $144.
