PARIS: French wheat exports outside the European Union were firm in January, hitting their highest level since August, although total exports so far this season remained well below the year-earlier level, customs data showed.
France, which faced its worst wheat harvest in three decades in 2016, exported some 372,000 tons of soft wheat outside the European Union in January, up from 361,000 in December, due notably to strong sales to Algeria, Yemen and Cuba.
This took the volume since the start of the 2016/17 season on July 1 to 2.8 million tons, down 51 percent from last season when the EU’s largest wheat producer had shipped 5.7 million tons of wheat outside the EU in the seven first months of the campaign.
Including 441,500 tons exported to other EU countries, France shipped almost 814,000 tons of soft wheat in January. This took total soft wheat exports since July 1 to 9.6 million tons, down 42 percent on the same period last season, the data showed.
In barley, French exports outside the EU reached 269,013 tons in January, virtually stable on the previous month. This brought the volume so far this season to 1.2 million tons, down 61 percent from a year earlier.
The monthly barley shipments included a rare cargo to Lebanon, along with exports to Jordan, Tunisia and Algeria.
Customs data for January also showed strong maize (corn) imports this months, at 85,250 tonne, of which just over 52,000 tons from Bulgaria, bringing the total in the July-January period to 367,146 tons, up 38 percent on the previous season.
