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There were no major changes to China’s corn, soybean and edible oils balance sheets for the 2022-23 marketing year, the monthly update to China’s Agriculture Supply and Demand Estimates (Casde) report showed Wednesday, February 8.
Supply and demand estimates for corn remained unchanged from January’s figures, with production pegged at 277.2 million tonnes, up from 272.6 million tonnes in the 2021-22 marketing year.
The country is expected to import 18 million tonnes of corn in 2022-23 and to consume 290.5 million tonnes domestically.
“It is expected that the consumption of pig feed will remain high, and the demand for meat and eggs is expected to increase after the Spring Festival,” Casde’s chief corn analyst Xu Weiping said.
The consumption of poultry feed is also expected to keep an upward trend after the festival, with corn processing plants seeking to replenish stocks and underpinning corn consumption, according to Weiping.
There were also no changes to the country’s soybean balance sheet for the 2022-23 marketing year.
Production remains estimated at 20.3 million tonnes, while imports are expected to reach 95.2 million tonnes, up from 91.6 million tonnes in 2021-22.
Domestic demand is estimated at 112.9 million tonnes, with 94.8 million tonnes expected to be processed by the country’s crush industry.
“On the domestic front, market transactions resumed after the festival, the demand for replenishment of downstream stocks is strong, and the supply of domestic soybeans is sufficient,” Casde’s chief soybean analyst Wang Yu said.
Yu noted that no major short-term price pressures are expected to arise from domestic supply and demand dynamics, although a caveat was raised as to price volatility linked to crop development conditions in South America, especially considering the impacts of the drought in Argentina.
Overall, Yu said the global supply outlook is expected to be plentiful as Argentine losses will likely be more than offset by higher output in other countries in the region, especially Brazil and Paraguay.
China has not changed its monthly estimates for 2022-23 edible oils production and imports, with the former pegged at 29.2 million tonnes and the latter at 8.4 million tonnes.
This compares to a production level of 27.6 million tonnes and imports of 5.8 million tonnes in 2021-22.
According to Casde, China is expected to produce 17.7 million tonnes of soy oil, 6.5 million tonnes of rapeseed (canola) oil and 3.3 million tonnes of peanut oil in 2022-23 while importing 4.5 million tonnes of palm oil, 1.5 million tonnes of rapeseed oil and 1.2 million tonnes of soy oil.
While there were no changes to edible oil supplies compared to the previous month, Casde has increased its estimates for 2022-23 domestic consumption by 180,000 tonnes to 36.5 million tonnes.
“[This was] mainly due to a faster-than-expected increase in the urbanization rate, with more farmers migrating to cities, which led to an increase in consumption,” Li Songlin, Casde’s edible vegetable oil’s chief analyst, said.
Songlin said low temperatures had damaged rapeseed crops in Jiangsu, Anhui and other production areas but that the impact was limited and has led to no changes in production estimates yet.