Australia exports 1.16Mt wheat in October

Australia exported 1,156,484 tonnes of wheat and durum in October, according to the latest data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The figure is up 20 percent from 961,717t shipped in September, but down 18pc from 1,405,885t shipped in October 2023.

In containerised exports for October 2024, Thailand on 28,746t followed by Vietnam on 28,097t, and Taiwan on 21,897t were the three major markets.

In bulk sales, Indonesia on 252,541t was the largest market by far, followed by The Philippines on 218,314t and South Korea on 143,000t.

Two Middle East destinations, Bahrain and Kuwait, which normally import Northern Hemisphere in October, have appeared as buying bulk cargoes in the latest data.

In Lachstock Consulting monthly wheat supply-and-demand report released yesterday, global competition for supply was said to be slowing as Russia’s export pace starts to wane, and the Russian export tax lifting by 30pc this week to close to U$50/t.

“This is not totally unexpected with the export pace in recent months as the Russian Ag ministry tries to slow shipments, but will give confidence to the global market that Russia is finally going to tap out on plugging the global wheat consumer with supply,” the report said.

Overnight, USDA issued its World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates, with Australia’s wheat production at 32 million tonnes (Mt), and exports at 25Mt unchanged from the November figures.

On major wheat exporters, USDA has cut its forecast for both Russian and EU wheat exports by 1Mt each to 47Mt and 29Mt respectively, but added 500,000t to Ukraine, now at 16.5Mt.

On the import side, USDA’s biggest change has been a 500,000t reduction to projected Chinese wheat imports, now seen at 11Mt.

New-crop shipments of Australian bulk wheat are expected to rise sharply in November, particularly out of Western Australian ports, while Queensland terminals and two at Newcastle in the northern half of New South Wales concentrate on shipping chickpeas in these early months.

Table 1: Australian containerised wheat and durum exports for August, September and October 2024. Source: ABS. NOTE: This table excludes 1,778,510t of wheat to Nepal, believed to be a coding error.

Table 2: Australian bulk wheat and durum exports for August, September and October 2024. Source: ABS

Tags: Australia, export, Vietnam, wheat, Thailand, Taiwan, durum, The Philippines