MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguay's record wheat crop nightmare for farmers' pockets

Uruguay expects this year its largest wheat harvest on record, 1.3 million tons including 900.000 for export, according to a report from the Agriculture Ministry Planning and Policies Office, OPYPA.

However a record crop is not synonymous of success for farmers' pockets: when wheat was sown it was worth over 400 US dollars the ton, but now it's down to 160 US dollars and even more disappointing it could not be enough to cover costs of booming times. This is particularly serious because land otherwise dedicated to other activities was ploughed over to plant wheat. The OPYPA report anticipates good yields (2.800 kilos per hectare compared to 3.000 for the last three crops) and better sanitary conditions because of the scarce rainfall during the November December maturing process of the crops. But there are other inconveniences regarding a bearish market for grains: insufficient storage capacity for a record volume of wheat and scarcity of harvesting equipment for such a sizeable area: 460.000 hectares, the largest in half a century, and a crop volume 85% higher than in 2007/08. OPYPA reports that so far this year Uruguay wheat exports have totalled 414.000 tons at an average price of 306 US dollars the ton. Flour sales also boomed this year with 37.000 tons equivalent to 18 million US dollars. Meantime farmers are holding on to their wheat crops in a desperate attempt to impede the price from further collapsing.