AUSTRALIA exported 571,826 tonnes of barley and 222,410t of sorghum in July, according to the latest export data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

The barley figure comprises 43,289t of malting, up 21 per cent from 35,680t shipped in June, while feed at 528,537t surged 42pc from 371,291t exported in June.

Mexico was the only destination to take a cargo of malting barley in July, while on feed,  Japan, followed by the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait were the three biggest customers, with Saudi Arabia and The Philippines also taking panamax cargoes.

July sorghum exports at 222,410t were up 31pc from 169,986t shipped in June, with China on 215,889t buying 97pc of July shipment.

Flexi Grain pool manager Sam Roache said July’s malting barley exports were supported by a return in Mexican demand.

“We have seen South and Central American demand right out into the new-crop year already, so we expect this business to continue to increase with the small and poor-quality Canadian harvest,” Mr Roache said.

“Given the higher base price for feed and assuming a normal quality profile, it will still be hard to see the grower malt spread maintain a long-term rally over $10-15/t plus without a Chinese re-entry.”

Despite feed barley shipments being sharply higher in July than in June, they underperformed on expected volume to Saudi Arabia.

“Considering this, we suggest that August could be a surprisingly big month to Saudi, as there was certainly some demand set out of Australia for the July-August period.

“In Asia, Philippines demand was large, with a potentially record 55,000t month, a great signal of continued Asian demand growth.

“Thailand was uncharacteristically small this month, but we are going through a shipment period where the market switched into cheap Black Sea feed wheat in the pressure before Ukraine and Russian harvest.

“The wheat market quickly recovered higher, sending demand back to barley from wheat-switching countries like Thailand, The Philipinnes and Vietnam, so we expect demand to re-emerge, if there is enough barley left.”

Mr Roache said the market had consistently seen barley shipments exceed expectations.

“We expect August to be larger than July, which is leading barley to a very tight carry-out across all zones.

“We expect to be running on fumes by the time the headers are in paddocks, especially in the southern states.”

Mr Roache said barley had a very different supply-and-demand scenario to wheat.

“It does not have the burdensome carryout in New South Wales, and therefore could trade very differently into 2022 than the broad expectation, especially in the event of a weather issue on the east coast over the next 12 months.”

New-crop feed barley business is said to be slow.

“Buyers are hanging back for Australian selling pressure, and Australian sellers are holding back for buyers to come into market.”

Mr Roache said Australia was clearly the cheapest origin in the world for generic barley for the November-December forward period.

“Aussie replacement is currently around $20-25/t below competing origins on a free-on-board basis.

“Australia enjoys a substantial freight advantage to around 30pc of its demand calculated on the last three months of shipment data.

“In general terms, we are even to slightly cheaper on freight costs versus Black Sea to the other 70pc of the demand we service, so we only need to be slightly cheaper in FOB terms to win the business.”

Sorghum appears well on track to reach 1 million tonnes expected in the current shipping year which started in autumn.

“We expect China to continue to take the vast majority of shipments until we run out, or there is political intervention.

“This situation with China should continue into the new-crop sorghum year and there is demand and scope to elevate more sorghum if we have the crop, especially in Central Queensland, where the supply chain has been under-utilised due to lower production of total crop.”

 

MALTING	May	June	July	Tonnes
Ecuador	5000	0	0	5000
Japan	750	750	0	1500
Mexico	0	0	38500	38500
Peru	53000	0	0	53000
Singapore	0	201	1628	1830
Thailand	1051	1765	1014	3830
Vietnam	4947	32964	2147	40058
TOTAL	64749	35680	43289	143717

Table 1: Australian malting barley exports for May, June and July 2021. Source: ABS

FEED	May	June	July	Tonnes
Bahrain	0	44	0	44
Hong Kong	0	12	12	24
Indonesia	0	258	242	500
Iran	126487	0	0	126487
Iraq	0	64824	0	64824
Japan	40919	80030	164370	285319
Kuwait	102385	33571	84581	220537
Macau	5	0	0	5
Malaysia	265	265	0	529
New Caledonia	0	390	461	851
New Zealand	365	12760	780	13905
Oman	32790	0	0	32790
Papua New Guinea	0	0	25	25
Philippines	1572	622	55846	58040
Qatar	74500	23100	0	97600
Saudi Arabia	231904	27836	66000	325740
Singapore	3	265	828	1096
South Korea	883	403	799	2085
Taiwan	1668	569	2749	4986
Thailand	104351	58485	1809	164644
UAE	21890	8824	107988	138702
Vietnam	65558	59034	42046	166639
TOTAL	805545	371291	528537	1705373

Table 2: Australian feed barley exports for May, June and July 2021. Source: ABS

SORGHUM	May	June	July	Tonnes
China	104754	98250	215889	418893
Japan	63	30618	583	31264
Kenya	0	35000	0	35000
Philippines	2167	820	3212	6199
Saudi Arabia	46	46	46	138
South Korea	24	0	0	24
Taiwan	2836	5125	2571	10531
UAE	0	0	110	110
Vietnam	2	127	0	129
TOTAL	109892	169986	222410	502288

Table 3: Australian sorghum exports for May, June and July 2021. Source: ABS