Russia could lift grain export ban this yr-official

A Russian diplomat said on Monday the country's ban on grain exports could be lifted this year but also gave harvest figures showing Russia could ill afford to ship its grain abroad The Russian government imposed the export ban from Aug. 15 to stabilise domestic prices after the worst drought in more than a century killed a significant part of the crop.
Oleg Kobiakov, first councillor of the foreign ministry's international organisations department, said Russia had sufficient grain stocks.
Russia's grain output, including wheat, is estimated at 55 million tonnes, with 25 to 26 million tonnes in reserve against an expected domestic demand of 77 million tonnes, the foreign ministry official said on the sidelines of a meeting of the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organisation.
"We now have assured (supply of) next year's domestic grains."

Asked if the government could lift the ban before the end of this year, he said, "We do not exclude such a possibility."
President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have said the ban is unlikely to be lifted before late 2011
"Domestic consumption is a priority," Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Reuters on Monday. "The ban may be lifted when we have a clear idea of what the carryover stocks are going to be." He did not say when this might happen.
Grain stocks carried over from year to year are normally calculated on June 30, the end of the crop year, or at the start of a new crop year on July 1.
From the start of the current 2010/11 crop year on July 1 until Aug. 15, Russia is estimated to have exported 3.6-3.8 million tonnes of grain.
The figures of 55 million tonnes of output and 26 million of grain stocks, versus consumption of 77 million, leaves Russia with carryover stocks of only 4 million tonnes on July 1, 2011, most of which have already been exported.
The latest Agriculture Ministry estimate for this year's grain crop is at a little over 60 million tonnes, down from 97 million in 2009 and 108 million in 2008.
That estimate is 5 million tonnes higher than both Kobiakov's figure and the ministry's harvest data from last week showing 55 million tonnes of grain by bunker weight by Sept. 22.
Russia's drought and subsequent ban on exports sparked a rally in global grain markets, pushing benchmark U.S. wheat prices to their highest level in two years.
Although wheat prices have dropped by 13 percent since the August peak of $8.41 a bushel, corn prices reached a new two-year high on Monday on estimates of lower U.S. yields and prospects of strong global demand.

Source: Reuters