NEW DELHI – Japan imported about 60,000 tonnes soymeal from India this week, indicating a revival in demand after the twin disasters of an earthquake and tsunami, but import enquiries waned from major Asian wheat importers who have stocked up on the grain.
There had been expectation that soymeal exports from India, Asia’s leading supplier, would have been hit due to poor demand from Japan, which imports an average 1 million tonnes of the feedstock from the south Asian nation. Last month, a senior industry official had said India’s oilmeal exports to Japan, Asia’s top feedstocks market, was likely to halve in March due to uncertainty over shipments to the disaster-hit nation.
Japan bought four to five shiploads of Indian soymeal at $435-$439 per tonne, including cost and freight, Vijay Shrishrimal, managing director of top exporter K.N. Resources Pvt Ltd, told Reuters. The cargoes are for April-May delivery.
“Surprisingly, demand from Japan is back to normal now. It seems that the fear of a dramatic fall in demand from Japan was largely misplaced. In fact, we have had not a single default, cancellation or diversion of contracts,” Shrishrimal noted.
He said Japan was likely to import 1.2 million tonnes of the animal feed from India in the new season from Oct. 1, marginally higher than 1.1 million tonnes a year earlier. India had exported 2.6 million tonnes of soymeal between Oct. 1 and Feb. 28, up from 1.3 million tonnes in the year ago period, industry officials said.
Major Asian wheat importers remained on the sidelines as most of them had stocked up the grain. Some traders said wheat importing countries such as Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia had stocks to last until September, while a few said import demand was expedted to remain subdued until June.
“There is not much activity. It has been very quiet as most importing countries have covered themselves until the current quarter,” a Singapore-based trader said. Another said over phone from Singapore that some countries had covered themselves until September.
Japan, a regular importer of wheat, said it would buy 5.11 million tonnes of the grain in the year to March 2012, down 5 percent from a year earlier. Traders said rising wheat prices could also have dissuaded some importers. On Thursday, benchmark Chicago prices jumped 36 cents, or five percent, to a three-week high of $7.63 for a quarter of a bushel.
First month CBOT wheat will rise to $7.72 per three quarters of bushel, according to Wang Tao, a Reuters market analyst for commodities and energy sectors. Cash prices were lower. Australia’s prime wheat was offered at $350 a tonne, free on board, a loss of $30 from last week.
Australian standard wheat was quoted at $340 a tonne. US standard white wheat was at $320 per tonne, dark northern spring wheat at $450 and hard red winter at $360.
