Malting barley bound for Vietnam loading at CBH’s Albany terminal last month. Photo: CBH Group

AUSTRALIA’S barley exports in March totalled 264,206 tonnes, down 24 per cent from 345,626t shipped in February, according to the latest export data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

China has maintained its position as Australia’s biggest malting barley customer, taking 132,799t of the March total of 153,377t, while  Thailand with 68,243t bought a little over half of the total feed shipments of 110,829t.

The Australian dollar’s dive in March prompted a whack of export business to be written, and a large proportion of that was shipped last month to destinations including China.

Between 1 December and 31 March, Australia’s barley shipments to China were of 563,640t malting barley and 64,500t of feed barley to China, almost half of Australia’s barley export shipments which totalled 1.3Mt.

Australia’s sorghum exports remain negligible, and the very small crop now being harvested in southern Queensland is unlikely to change that.

In June, central Queensland will start its sorghum harvest which, due to a dry finish, is unlikely to make bulk exports possible, but should prompt a jump in containerised exports.

NOTE: December-March export totals to China contain amended figures.

Table 1: Australian malting barley exports for October-December 2019 and January-March 2020. Source: ABS

Table 2: Australian feed barley exports for October-December 2019 and January-March 2020. Source: ABS

Table 3: Australian sorghum exports for October-December 2019 and January-March 2020. Source: ABS