In just a week, a ton of wheat has fallen in price by $ 3-7 per ton. Analysts attribute this to an increase in duties.
Currently, a ton of wheat for export costs about $ 285. Against this background, the level of shipments of Russian grain abroad has significantly decreased. It is planned that up to 2 million tons of grain will be sold in March, half of which will be wheat. For comparison: in February, exporters sent abroad 4.3 million tons of grain, with 3.8 million tons of wheat.
This dynamics is largely due to the fact that almost everyone who wanted to buy wheat from the Russian Federation had already «bought» in February, when the duty was 25 euros per ton. After it rose to 50 euros per tonne from March 1, there was an expected drawdown in demand. Currently, for example, there are practically no people willing to conclude a contract with deliveries in April.
At the same time, as Igor Pavensky, head of the Institute for Agricultural Market Studies, noted, the drop in demand for wheat can be offset by its growth in relation to other grains. For example, it is assumed that the export of barley and corn can grow up to two times (from 228-230 to 475-530 thousand tons for each crop).
Should we expect a decrease in prices on the domestic market?
The likelihood of this is quite high, because now, given the high duty, the demand for wheat from exporters has become rather sluggish. At the same time, most of these companies managed to make decent stocks for themselves, so now they can work for a while without purchasing additional grain from producers. At least they will definitely have enough reserves to fulfill the March contracts.
As for processing enterprises (for example, flour mills), in the previous season most of them bought the minimum amount of grain due to its high cost. In addition, this cost was considered unreasonable by many processing enterprises and expected to decrease. It may happen just now, when producers will simply have nowhere to put their surplus, especially on the eve of a new harvest.
According to experts, the introduction of the duty, especially given the fact that they want to make it floating in June, may ultimately help stabilize the situation on the domestic market and ensure relatively low prices for groceries in stores.
It is also possible that when the government finishes its development and learns to smoothly regulate supply and demand using duty rates, the Russian grain market will finally become predictable, stable and calm.
