War-torn Syria to import 1M tonnes of wheat to boost buffer stock

Keyword:
Publish time: 11th November, 2014      Source: www.cnchemicals.com
Information collection and data processing:  CCM     For more information, please contact us
  
   


November 11, 2014

   

   

War-torn Syria to import 1M tonnes of wheat to boost buffer stock

   
   
   

War-wracked Iran may have to import 1 million tonnes of wheat to boost its strategic reserve, as its wheat supply was expected to last only up to the first half of 2015, a Reuters report quoted a source at the state cereal body Hoboob as saying. Hoboob stands for General Organization for Cereal Processing and Trade.

   

   

According to the report, the unnamed source said concerned authorities were still studying the mode of imports—"whether it will be tenders or direct contracts."

   

   

As the Syrian government has lost control over large areas of farmland, Hoboob''s purchase of local wheat this year was only half (523,000 tonnes) of last year''s purchase of slightly over 1 million tonnes, the same source was quoted. A tonne of wheat was bought for 45,000 Syrian pounds (US$277.26).

   

   

The breadbasket provinces of Raqqa and Deir al-Zour are now mostly controlled by jihadist rebels, and the Hoboob collection centres where farmers can sell their wheat now number only 31 from over 140 three years ago, before the war started.

   

   

Syrian wheat farmers produced an average of around 3.5 million tonnes a year before the war, of which about 2.5 million tonnes were bought by the government.

   

   

Syria''s annual wheat consumption is estimated at 2.7 million to 3.0 million tonnes.

   

   

Syria plans to import one million tonnes of wheat as loss of government control over large swathes of farmland and a poor harvest have cut domestic purchases by half, a source at the state''s General Organization for Cereal Processing and Trade (Hoboob) told Reuters.

   

   

"We are still studying the mode of imports, whether it will be tenders or direct contracts, and we will make a decision about that shortly," said the source, who asked not to be named.

   

   

He said the government had enough wheat to satisfy consumption until mid-2015 from previous imports and its local harvest, and that the imports of one million tonnes were necessary to boost its strategic reserve, he said.

   

   

He declined to say how much wheat was currently in the strategic reserve. Before the war, Syria kept an annual strategic stock of around three million tonnes.

   

   

Experts told Reuters in April that they expected a total harvest this year of between one million and 1.7 million tonnes.

   

   

But with much of Syria''s main grain-producing region out of government control, Hoboob bought only 523,000 tonnes of wheat from local farmers this year, at 45,000 Syrian pounds ($277.26) a tonne, compared to slightly over a million tonnes in 2013, the source said.

   

Breadbasket provinces

   

   

The breadbasket provinces of Raqqa and Deir al-Zour are mostly under the control of jihadist Islamic State rebels, and Hasaka is also under rebel control except for the provincial capital of the same name, which the government holds.

   

   

The number of Hoboob collection centres, where farmers can go to sell their wheat, has shrunk from over 140 before the start of the war three years ago to just 31 this year.

   

   

To overcome the problem, the agency offered farmers in areas outside government control money to transport their wheat to government collection centres, the source said.

   

   

Still, only around 17,000 tonnes of wheat were procured from Raqqa, whose collection centre was in Damascus.

   

   

In Hasaka province, Hoboob managed to procure 366,000 tonnes. But even in Hasaka, Hoboob failed to ship out around 200,000 tonnes of last year''s crop because of rebel advances.

   

   

Before the war, Syria produced around 3.5 million tonnes of wheat a year on average, of which the government bought about 2.5 million.

   

   

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) estimates Syria''s annual wheat consumption at 2.7 million to 3.0 million tonnes.

   

Lack of seed

   

   

With planting beginning now for the next harvest in May-June, FAO says farmers will continue to be dogged not only by the dire security situation but also by a lack of seeds, fuel and fertilizer, because the government network that used to distribute these has largely broken down.

   

   

"It will at least be the continuation of a very difficult producing period ahead," said Eriko Hibi, FAO''s Syria representative.

   

   

The fighting makes it difficult to establish how much farmland has been lost to the conflict, but Hibi said the most recent figures indicated that the area planted with wheat had shrunk 15 per cent from the average area planted in 2007-11.

   

   

In neighbouring Iraq, Islamic State militants have been milling grain stored in government silos and distributing the flour on the local market, and even trying to sell smuggled wheat back to the government to finance their war effort, an Iraqi official told Reuters in August.

   

Syria''s state cereal body, the General Establishment for Processing and Trade (Hoboob).