The weather continues to dominate the domestic wheat market
The fundamentals in the domestic maize market remain unchanged
June 20, 2018
South African Agricultural Commodities Weekly Wrap
June 22, 2018
The weather will remain central in the discussion of the domestic wheat market for some time as the crop is still at its early stages of development that requires moistures, with some wheat-growing regions such as Free State province still at planting stages.
This morning the weather charts show a possibility of light showers of between 10 and 20 millimetres within the next eight days in the areas around Swartland, Helderberg, Winelands and Overberg regions of the Western Cape province. This will help sustain crops in fair condition in the Swartland and Overberg regions, while Swartland could be strained due to lower soil moisture (topsoil and subsoil).
Be that as it may, the Western Cape province still needs intense and persistent rainfall in order to sufficiently improve subsoil moisture. The recent showers in some regions have been helpful in terms of sustaining the crop and improving topsoil moisture. Also worth noting is that the Western Cape provincial dam levels averaged 32 percent in the week of 18 June 2018, up by 6 percentage points from the previous week and 11 percentage points from the corresponding period last year.
In our previous notes, we talked a bit about expectations of higher rainfall over the Western Cape province within the next three months, leaning on the South African Weather Service and International Research Institute for Climate and Society’s forecast. These views have not changed. There is still some level of optimism regarding the weather in the medium term.
