The US Department of Agriculture (USDA) has adjusted Ukraine’s wheat export forecast for the 2024/25 marketing year (MY, July 2024-June 2025) and lowered it by 0.5m tonnes to 15.5m tonnes, and corn by 1m tonnes to 22m tonnes.
The updated USDA forecast for February notes that in 2024/25 MY wheat and maize production in Ukraine will remain at 22.9 million tonnes and 26.5 million tonnes, respectively.
At the same time, wheat production and consumption are forecast to increase slightly, but USDA believes trade volumes and ending stocks will be lower. Accordingly, the forecast for world wheat production is raised by 0.6 million tonnes to 793.8 million tonnes, thanks to higher production in Kazakhstan (+0.6 million tonnes, to 18.6 million tonnes) and Argentina (+0.2 million tonnes, to 17.7 million tonnes).
World wheat consumption will also rise by 1.8 million tonnes to 803.7 million tonnes, thanks to greater use of coarse grains and transitional residues in the EU, Kazakhstan, Thailand and Ukraine.
Meanwhile, world wheat trade will decline by 3 million tonnes to 209 million tonnes, due to lower exports by the EU (-1.0 million tonnes, to 28.0 million tonnes), Mexico, Russia (-0.5 million tonnes, to 45.5 million tonnes), Turkey and Ukraine (-0.5 million tonnes, to 15.5 million tonnes). The largest decline is expected in China, down 2.5 million tonnes to 8.0 million tonnes, which would be the lowest import figure in five years, although the country was the world’s leading wheat supplier last year.
A similar picture awaits world ending stocks for 2024/25 MY, which are forecast to fall by 1.3m tonnes to 257.6m tonnes, according to the updated forecast, due to a decline in China, partly offset by higher stocks in Russia, Kazakhstan and Ukraine.
The global maize market is expected to decline across the board in 2024/25 Mg. World maize production is expected to decline by 1.9 million tonnes to 1 billion 212.5 million tonnes, mainly due to Argentina (-1.0 million tonnes, to 50.0 million tonnes) due to lower yields due to heatwaves and Brazil (-1.0 million tonnes, to 126.0 million tonnes) and due to slow planting.
The main changes in world maize trade relate to lower projected maize exports from Brazil (-1.0 million tonnes, to 46.0 million tonnes), Ukraine (-1.0 million tonnes, to 22.0 million tonnes) and South Africa. External ending stocks of maize for 2024/25 Mg are reduced by 3 million tonnes, to 290.3 million tonnes.