South Africa, the continent’s largest producer of maize, may run out of the yellow variety if exports of the grain rise further, pushing up the cost of white maize, one of the nation’s staple foods, stock broking firm BVG said.
The nation shipped 79 055 metric tonnes of yellow maize in the week to June 28, including 54 112 tonnes to Japan and 23 043 tonnes to Taiwan, the South African Information Service said in a statement on its website.
The country has exported 377 367 tonnes of the grain since the start of the marketing year in May, according to Sagis. That compares with 18 333 tonnes in the same period a year earlier and 413 152 tonnes for the entire 2013 marketing year that ended in April.
“If we continue at this brisk pace, we will definitely have shortages of yellow corn,” Brink van Wyk, a trader at BVG, said by phone from Pretoria. “What we have available this year for exports of yellow corn is one million tonnes.”
South Africa uses yellow maize as animal feed, while meal made from the white variety is one of the country’s dietary staples. The country will probably consume 4.54-million tonnes of yellow maize and could supply 5.74-million tonnes in the marketing year through April, the Grain and Oilseeds Supply and Demand Estimates Committee said in its first ever report, released on June 28.
“We either need to export less, or we use more white corn for cattle feed, or we import more yellow corn,” Van Wyk said.
Forecast Lowered
The Crop Estimates Committee cut its forecast for corn output by 0.6% to 11.38-million tonnes, it said in a June 25 report. South Africa produced 12.8-million tonnes in 2010, the biggest harvest since 1982.
Grain SA, the biggest representative of farmers in South Africa, says the nation has 620 000 tonnes of yellow maize available for export.
“If the average weekly export tempo of the past eight weeks should be maintained, the remaining export maize of 321 688 tonnes should be exported within the next nine weeks,” the organization said in an emailed newsletter yesterday. “This means that the yellow maize available for export should be completed by the end of August. South Africa can potentially experience a shortage in yellow maize for the biggest part of this marketing year.”
Yellow corn for delivery in September, the most active contract, declined 0.4% to R2.176 a tonne, the lowest since May 21, by the close on the South African Futures Exchange on Tuesday. The white variety fell 0.6% to R2 236 a tonne. – Bloomberg