Forecast for larger EU grain crop, but rapeseed output pegged lower

This is slightly up from the March forecast of 298.5m tons and significantly up from last year’s crop when farmers harvested 281m tons of grains, said the European association, which represents the trade in cereals, rice, feedstuffs, oilseeds, olive oil, oils and fats and agrosupply.

Coceral pegged wheat production at 140.3m tons, up slightly from the 139.8m tons seen in March and well above the 127.4m in 2018.

After a dry autumn in 2018 and a dry period of six weeks in March and April, growing conditions have stabilized recently due to rains, said the group.

Barley​

The EU’s barley production forecast for 2019 stands at 59m tons, down from 59.4m previously, but up from 56.1m tons last year.

It has also revised upwards the EU’s corn crop forecast, placing it at 62.9m tons. Last year, EU corn crop production reached 60.9m tons mainly due to a much higher than previously expected acreage in Germany and Romania.

Coceral, though, has reduced its forecast for EU rapeseed production from 18.6m tons to 17.9m tons, due to what it said was a sharp reduction in the French crop.

Strategie Grains’ outlook​

Last week saw French consultancy firm, Strategie Grains, said it expects the EU's harvests of wheat, barley and maize to be greater than last year.

“Rains arrived in late April/early May, lifting earlier concerns across much of the EU although some pockets of drought persist in central and north EU countries.”​

Though the consultancy did revise downwards its harvest forecasts by almost 1m tons for wheat and by 700,000 tons for barley, reflecting, it added, smaller acreage than previously envisaged in Denmark.