PARIS: A vessel is due to reach France next week to unload wheat from Bulgaria while cargoes of UK wheat are also expected at French ports, shipping data showed on Wednesday, in a sign of unusual imports of wheat into France following a poor harvest. The bulk carrier AS Elenia is transporting 33,500 tonnes of wheat that was loaded at the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Varna, the data showed.
France, the European Union’s biggest wheat grower and exporter, usually imports only small volumes and rarely takes any wheat from Bulgaria. Its previous wheat imports from the eastern EU country date back to the 2010/11 season when it took in just 11.5 tonnes, French customs records show.
Dunkirk is also scheduled to receive a small wheat import cargo of 4,000 tonnes from Britain, with a vessel due to call this week, while two shipments of 3,000 tonnes of UK wheat each are due to arrive at Rouen, another northern French port, this week, shipping data showed.
France regularly takes in small amounts of wheat from its neighbour but traders said the prospect of imports from the UK so early in the season has attracted the market’s attention. Around 10 cargoes or about 30,000 tonnes of UK wheat in total were thought to be lined up to arrive at Rouen in the coming weeks, traders said.
France is also set to import a large cargo of wheat from Romania in the second half of August, traders said last month, reflecting a poor French harvest due to bad weather that has cut supply and widened the gap between French and eastern European prices. “We’re going to see these kinds of unusual import flows throughout the season,” one trader said. Several traders said the different wheat shipments would not be conventional imports for immediate local consumption.
Some said they would be used to deliver against Euronext futures, in view of tight harvest supplies in France and lower prices for other European wheat compared to Euronext futures. Other traders said the wheat from Bulgaria would be re-exported to the United States to fulfil a previous deal to ship animal-feed wheat to the US from a French port.
Shipping data indicates that a vessel is due to call at Dunkirk and Rouen later this month to load feed wheat for Wilmington in the United States, the second such shipment since July. In the smaller durum wheat market, the variety used to make pasta, France was also set to import after a poor crop.
A vessel carrying 18,000 tonnes of durum from Greece was expected to call at Rouen next week, following a 7,000 tonne shipment in July, shipping data showed. Unlike the common wheat cargoes, the durum would be for direct use by industrial processors in France, traders said.
