November 27, 2014
Rising Korean demand seen for French wheat
A cargo ship bound for South Korea is being loaded with French wheat for livestock feed, a sign of Asian demand for the reduced-quality crop, Bloomberg reports.
"A single cargo of 58,000 tons seems pretty significant," Thibaut Amate, an analyst at Noisy-le-Grand, France-based Horizon Soft Commodities, said. "The abundance of feed wheat this year has logically weighed on premiums, which has only increased its competitiveness."
Rain this summer hurt the quality of France's wheat crop, leaving the European Union's largest grain shipper with a huge haul of low-grade soft wheat. Of this year's harvest, 46% is mainly suitable for animal feed, compared with 12% in 2013, according to a survey by FranceAgriMer and crop researcher Arvalis.
France shipped 1,337 tons of wheat to South Korea in the first three months of the crop season that started July 1, customs data show.