FOB Prices and Freight Rate App (Updated 15 March)
Ocean Freight Comments - 15 March 2024 By Matt Herrington Freight markets were mostly higher this week with higher cargo demand from the East Coast of South America pushing Panamax and Supramax rates higher. Freight forward agreements (FFAs) for Panamax vessels are also rising with the average...
Interactive Ocean Freight Rates (Updated 15 March)
Ocean Freight Comments - 15 March 2024 By Matt Herrington Freight markets were mostly higher this week with higher cargo demand from the East Coast of South America pushing Panamax and Supramax rates higher. Freight forward agreements (FFAs) for Panamax vessels are also rising with the average...
Eat Your Rice
South Korea wants more rice to be consumed and is subsidizing rice for college students, the cohort least likely to eat breakfast, and is incentivizing food products made from rice flour. Rice production is dropping as population growth has stalled, but rice consumption is dropping even faster...
Grain Substitution
Grain producers saw the value of their output fall in 2023 and the best they can hope for in 2024 is to stem the bleeding. Meanwhile, Europeans are frustrated as the price of cocoa has risen more than 50 percent over the past year. Asians are frightened as the price of rice has risen nearly 40...
Fostering Rice for Flour Unsustainable
South Korea has had a problem. Its farmers insist on growing rice while its consumers are increasingly switching consumption to wheat-based products. For the second time in recent years the government has contrived a subsidy plan to reduce rice output in favor of wheat or soybeans. It provides...
Tangential Rice Market Impacts
Given current tight global rice stocks and high prices (see graph below), the question is how much wheat will be substituted for food or feed use. Rice prices have dropped since their peak early this year, but wheat is still 35 percent cheaper by weight than rice as a food grain. It is one reas...
Vietnam’s Steady Growth
USDA/FAS forecasts Vietnam’s feed demand to grow to 26.6 MMT. This is largely pushed by a 3.3 percent expansion in pig production, and poultry rising by 2.3 percent. The overall economy is forecast to grow by 5 percent this year. Over the most recent four-year period, soybean imports are...
Rice Signals Future
Global rice stocks are down just 2.7 percent this year, but the drop is larger in key rice consuming countries, plus the largest rice exporting nation, India, imposed an export restriction. This has caused an exaggerated response in price with global values rising 29 percent year-on-year. ...
Rice Constrained
The Philippines Department of Agriculture announced the need to import another 500 KMT of rice. The country is already the second largest importer of rice after China, and this purchase will ensure it is a record year for Philippine imports. For most staple commodities, this is not a large volu...
Similarities of Farming and Manufacturing
Debate around the reauthorization of the U.S. farm bill is focused on the legislation’s two major functions, domestic food assistance and farm price supports. The former involves Republicans trying to reduce the most generous portions of what amounts to 81 percent of farm bill spending, a...
Türkiye’s Higher Wheat Flour Exports
Türkiye is the world’s largest exporter of wheat flour, and the International Grains Council says the country will export a record 5.4 MMT in MY 2023/24. That is up 12.5 percent from MY 2022/23. Part of the reason is a bumper domestic wheat crop based largely on higher yield. Rains a...
Forever Poor
Dhaka’s The Daily Star reports that Bangladesh seeks to avoid the increased trade disciplines that comes with the country’s elevation above least developed status. Except for the covid lockdown period, Bangladesh’s economy has been growing at 7 percent or better each year. Off...
FOB Prices and Freight Rate App (Updated 15 March)
Ocean Freight Comments - 15 March 2024 By Matt Herrington Freight markets were mostly higher this week with higher cargo demand from the East Coast of South America pushing Panamax and Supramax rates higher. Freight forward agreements (FFAs) for Panamax vessels are also rising with the average...
Interactive Ocean Freight Rates (Updated 15 March)
Ocean Freight Comments - 15 March 2024 By Matt Herrington Freight markets were mostly higher this week with higher cargo demand from the East Coast of South America pushing Panamax and Supramax rates higher. Freight forward agreements (FFAs) for Panamax vessels are also rising with the average...
Eat Your Rice
South Korea wants more rice to be consumed and is subsidizing rice for college students, the cohort least likely to eat breakfast, and is incentivizing food products made from rice flour. Rice production is dropping as population growth has stalled, but rice consumption is dropping even faster...
Grain Substitution
Grain producers saw the value of their output fall in 2023 and the best they can hope for in 2024 is to stem the bleeding. Meanwhile, Europeans are frustrated as the price of cocoa has risen more than 50 percent over the past year. Asians are frightened as the price of rice has risen nearly 40...
Fostering Rice for Flour Unsustainable
South Korea has had a problem. Its farmers insist on growing rice while its consumers are increasingly switching consumption to wheat-based products. For the second time in recent years the government has contrived a subsidy plan to reduce rice output in favor of wheat or soybeans. It provides...
Tangential Rice Market Impacts
Given current tight global rice stocks and high prices (see graph below), the question is how much wheat will be substituted for food or feed use. Rice prices have dropped since their peak early this year, but wheat is still 35 percent cheaper by weight than rice as a food grain. It is one reas...
Vietnam’s Steady Growth
USDA/FAS forecasts Vietnam’s feed demand to grow to 26.6 MMT. This is largely pushed by a 3.3 percent expansion in pig production, and poultry rising by 2.3 percent. The overall economy is forecast to grow by 5 percent this year. Over the most recent four-year period, soybean imports are...
Rice Signals Future
Global rice stocks are down just 2.7 percent this year, but the drop is larger in key rice consuming countries, plus the largest rice exporting nation, India, imposed an export restriction. This has caused an exaggerated response in price with global values rising 29 percent year-on-year. ...
Rice Constrained
The Philippines Department of Agriculture announced the need to import another 500 KMT of rice. The country is already the second largest importer of rice after China, and this purchase will ensure it is a record year for Philippine imports. For most staple commodities, this is not a large volu...
Similarities of Farming and Manufacturing
Debate around the reauthorization of the U.S. farm bill is focused on the legislation’s two major functions, domestic food assistance and farm price supports. The former involves Republicans trying to reduce the most generous portions of what amounts to 81 percent of farm bill spending, a...
Türkiye’s Higher Wheat Flour Exports
Türkiye is the world’s largest exporter of wheat flour, and the International Grains Council says the country will export a record 5.4 MMT in MY 2023/24. That is up 12.5 percent from MY 2022/23. Part of the reason is a bumper domestic wheat crop based largely on higher yield. Rains a...
Forever Poor
Dhaka’s The Daily Star reports that Bangladesh seeks to avoid the increased trade disciplines that comes with the country’s elevation above least developed status. Except for the covid lockdown period, Bangladesh’s economy has been growing at 7 percent or better each year. Off...