Barley: Take a deep breath - a sharp consecutive cut in planted acreages
April 4, 2018 at 10:51 AM ,
Starry Night Ltd.
BULGARIA. The early forecast sets a much better general outlook for the weather conditions during the month of April. The temperatures will be somewhat higher for that time of the Spring while the expected sporadic showers in some regions will maintain the optimal level of moisture reserves in the soil; some farmers are quite apprehensive about further rains, though! Towards the end of the month, frosts are likely to fall.
Barley: a sharp cut it planted acreages
Although the weather outlook seems favorable for farmers throughout the country, the current outlook for the expected harvest of barley seems less so. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, current estimates of sowed land with barley stand at 113,665 ha, which on a year-to-year basis is by 12.6% lower than estimates at that time last year. Such a cut in planted acreages is not an isolated case, but instead, it has become a consistent trend. A case in point, last year’s planted acreages were reduced by 19.8% from those in 2016 while those of 2016 lagged behind by close to 8% from those planted in 2015.
Harvest 2017-18 (01.07.2017 - 30.03.2018) units in MT |
|
Beginning availability |
22,000 |
Aggregate output |
633,393 |
Imports |
5,314 |
Domestic consumption |
264,000 |
beer production |
58,500 |
feed |
175,500 |
seeds |
30,000 |
Exports to the world |
301,602 |
to EU markets |
259,432 |
to rest of the world |
42,170 |
Source: Bulgarian Ministry of Agriculture
At the beginning of harvest 2017-18, farmers within the Southeast region complained that buyers offered too low a price for their output to survive in the short-term. At that time, some farmers ominously promised to cut their future plots of barley and focus on more profitable ones instead such as rapeseed, for instance. And, cut they did! The Spring has not yet passed to evaluate what the season will have in store for farmers, but one thing is certain: expected output will be lower than the current one, ceteris paribus. Whether that will be reflected on higher prices remains to be seen since the local market does not exist in a vacuum, but instead is attuned to regional market forces.