South African Agricultural Commodities Weekly Wrap

• At risk of sounding like a broken record, the latest data from the national Crop Estimate Committee reinforced the view that South Africa’s summer grain and oilseed supplies are in good shape in the 2018/19 marketing year.
• Most of the crop forecasts were left unchanged from last month with the exception of sorghum and sunflower seed which were revised up by 29 percent and 8 percent. Another welcome development was on winter crops, with wheat first production forecasts showing an 18 percent uptick from last year’s harvest.
• Although South Africa is not a net exporter of all the grains, the import requirements for crops which the country imports will be reduced significantly in the 2018/19 season.
• The price movements somewhat mirrored the aforementioned developments, with all grains and oilseed closing in negative territory compared to last week’s average prices.
• The SAFEX beef carcass market experienced a quiet week with prices unchanged from levels seen last week. In terms of the supply, the South African farmers slaughtered 212 060 head of cattle in July 2018, down by a percentage point from July 2017 due to the herd rebuilding process after a reduction during the 2015-16 drought.
• Looking ahead, the data calendar for next week is fairly light with no major releases.

Sourced: Agbiz, Agribusiness Research

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