As we said few days ago, the Soviet Ag agriculture consultancy told that it had lowered its estimate for Russia’s 2020-21 wheat exports from 40.8 million tonnes to 36.3 million due to an upcoming wheat export tax.
As know, Russia is attempting to stabilize food prices with a grain export quota and wheat export tax that will be in effect from Feb. 15 to June 30.
The Russian ministry of agriculture, had espect that farmers have delaied their wheat sales until July 2021 when the export tax is no longer in place, favoring internal market.
However, a significant number of farmers are deciding to postpone sales until the 2021-22 season starts, hoping for a rapid strengthening of prices after the tax is lifted.
In addicyion, Russia, becoming one of the world’s leading wheat exporters in recent years, is also facing the prospect of a smaller-than-average crop due to weather concerns.
Conditions have been dry since most of the crop was planted this fall.
The share of grain sowings in poor condition was at a seven-year high as of early December.
Just to remember, in the 2019-20 marketing season, Russia was the world’s second-ranked wheat exporter, shipping 34.4 million tonnes to foreign markets and maybe, the total would have been higher, but Russia announced on April 26, 2020 would halted exports for the remainder of the marketing year, ended on June 30, 2020, to protect domestic supply and contain prices amid upheaval from the COVID-19 pandemic and a plunge in oil prices.
