Egypt’s GASC buys 465,000 tonnes of wheat in tender

Egypt’s state grains buyer, the General Authority for Supply Commodities (GASC), said on Wednesday it bought 465,000 tonnes of wheat in an international tender.

The purchase comprised 175,000 tonnes of Russian wheat, 240,000 tonnes of Romanian wheat and 50,000 tonnes of Bulgarian wheat, it said.

The purchase marks GASC’s biggest wheat buy since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine disrupted global supplies and sent prices to record-highs.

Traders said the cargoes were bought at a cost & freight price of $480 per tonne, a 41% hike from Egypt’s last tender before the invasion.

Ukraine is seeking ways to get grain out of the country by breaking a months-long blockade of the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea by the Russian navy and moving more by land.

Meanwhile, Egypt’s government has bean leaning on an ongoing local harvest, with officials previously indicating that Egypt would be in no rush to import.

The government, which provides steeply-subsidised bread to more than 70 million of Egypt’s estimated 103 million people, has set an ambitious target to buy six million tonnes of domestic wheat this year, two-thirds more than in either of the previous two years.

As of Wednesday, the government has procured 3.38 million tonnes of domestic wheat. The harvest is expected to end in July.

Tags: Egypt, tender, grain