Russia’s Bumper Wheat Crop Bumps itself to World’s Top Producer

Russia Becomes World’s Top Wheat Producer

This is a story that will keep American wheat farmers quaking in their boots. This is all according to “a record wheat crop in Russia that threatens American farmers” reported Wall Street Journal. The Australian stated that Russia has become the world’s new agricultural superpower.

A quarter century after the collapse of the USSR, Russian farmers are finally poised to beat the record for grain production that the country set during the Soviet era.

The harvest will total at least 130.7 million metric tons this year on bumper wheat and corn crops, said Vladimir Petrichenko, director general of Moscow-based consultant ProZerno. That would push production 2.6 percent above the previous all-time high in 1978, a year before the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan under leader Leonid Brezhnev.

“Weather conditions this year have been ideal,” Petrichenko said by phone. “It fell on a key period for plant development.” See more here.

Russia’s Grain Output for Last Five Years

To boost its capacity to ship grain after losing access to Baltic ports, Russia embarked on projects to build new terminals in the Black, Caspian and Azov seas and modernize grain terminals such as the Novorossiysk Grain Plant.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

While more projects to boost Russia’s export capacity are being built or discussed none is set to be completed before 2020, meaning the country is more likely to add to its grain stocks than flood the global market.

Forecasts for Russia’s 2017-18 grain crop have been steadily upgraded in recent months but officials and analysts have left export estimates largely unchanged at about 45 million. See more here.

THANKS FOR SANCTIONS:

A Record Wheat Crop in Russia Surpasses American Farmers Input