Excerpt from report by state-owned Kazakh news agency Kazinform

 

Astana, 16 August: Kazakh wheat exporters may face difficulties due to wheat production growth in Russia and Ukraine. The [Kazakh] minister of agriculture, Akylbek Kurishbayev, said this at a session in the ministry chaired by Prime Minister Karim Masimov, a Kazinform [news agency] correspondent reports.

 

Akylbek Kurishbayev said that Russia may harvest 90-96m tonnes of grain and legume crops this year against 81.8m tonnes harvested last year. It was forecasted that gross grain crop in Ukraine would be at the level of 40m [tonnes] this year, including 20m [tonnes] of wheat, against 28,5m tonnes [of grain], including 13.9m tonnes of wheat last year.

 

"Due to an intensive wheat shipping for export by Russian and Ukrainian traders in September-December of the current year, the Black Sea and Azov Sea ports will be busy till next year. This will impede Kazakh grain exports due to the congestion of wagons in the ports," the minister said.

 

[Passage omitted difficulties in trading with Iran due to UN sanctions; high export railway tariffs, making Kazakh wheat prices up]