Wheat harvest may go down one third in Kazakhstan

Wheat harvest in Ukraine may be 37 percent less than last year in 2012, while the harvest in Kazakhstan is expected to decrease by 36 percent in Kazakhstan, Interfax-Kazakhstan reports citing the experts of the UN Food and Agricultural Organization. According to the experts, Ukrainian wheat harvest will make around 14 million tons versus 22.3 million tons last year, while only 14.5 million tons will be harvested in Kazakhstan versus 22.7 million tons in 2011. The wheat harvest in Russian is expected to reach 56.8 million tons compared to last year’s harvest of 56.2 million tons. Ukrainian winter crops were damaged by unusually cold weather and drought in several regions of the country. Kazakhstan, on the contrary, had excessive rains. Last year’s good harvests in Ukraine, Russia and Kazakhstan caused a significant wheat prices drop at the world markets. Wheat futures went 20 percent down at the Chicago Commodity Market in the last 12 months. Bad harvest of this year will likely promote prices stabilization. Production of coarse grains (barley, corn and sorgo) in Ukraine may go down to 32.9 million tons in 2012 compared to 33.5 million tons last year. Production of coarse grains in Russia will remain at relatively the same level as last year and will make 34.3 million tons.