
Brazil has begun shipping rice to South Africa, competing with Thailand, the largest source of the grain for Africa’s largest economy. A shipment of rice from Brazil’s Santa Catarina state left Santos bound for South Africa this week.

Argentina liberated 450.000 tons of wheat for export, a decision which is believed to be closely linked to Sunday’s election in the farming province of Santa Fe where the government of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner suffered a major defeat.

Soybean processing and exports from the US, Argentina and Brazil, the largest shippers, were below expectations in the second quarter on reduced Chinese imports and competition from palm oil, Oil World said in a Tuesday released report.

Brazil will reduce the ethanol content in gasoline in another effort to contain inflation since sugar (and ethanol) prices because of a poor crop have been soaring, according to the Sao Paulo press.

“Saving in US dollars or in soybeans is the same” cautioned Argentine economist Carlos Melconian, who argued that “grain and oilseed prices are more linked to the value of the dollar than to demand for food produce”.

In a bid to encourage young people to live and work in the Camp, the Falkland Islands Training Centre is now offering an Agriculture Apprenticeship following much research and planning that started in early 2010.

United States industry and agriculture lobbies are again advocating forcefully before Congress on the pending free trade agreement with Colombia claiming the delay is costing market share to a more aggressive Mercosur.

Sugar supplies will remain limited until the 2012-13 harvest begins in top producer Brazil, broker FCStone do Brasil said citing futures traded in New York. The rise in sugar price helped push the FAO Food Price Index to 234 points in June, which is 39% higher than a year ago.

Sugar jumped the most since October after an industry group said output would decline in Brazil, the world’s biggest grower. Production in the Centre South, Brazil’s largest growing area, may drop by as much as 1 million metrics in the current season compared with a year earlier, Unica said on Friday.

The European Commission approved this week 26 programs in 13 Member States to provide information and promote agricultural products in the European Union. Total budget for the programs, which will run for between one and three years, is €75.1 million, of which the EU will contribute €37.6 million (50%).