Italy to launch durum wheat futures contract

Reuters / Borsa Italiana is set to launch Europe’s first futures market for durum wheat in November to cater to demand from the continent’s Italian-led pasta makers, but building sufficient trading volumes will be a challenge, traders say. Grain futures generally take a long time to attract a large trading base, and the minimal volumes

Western grain system humming so far this crop year

Canada’s grain-handling and transportation system performed above average during the first 13 weeks of the new crop year, but it’s too soon to tell if there’s a connection with ending of the Canadian Wheat Board’s monopoly, according to Mark Hemmes, president of Quorum Corporation, the firm hired by the federal government to monitor system performance.



The reason farmers sought market power back then

The following contains excerpts from comments to the recent Fields on Wheels conference by Paul Earl, who has a PhD in history and is acting director of the University of Manitoba’s Transport Institute. Earl spent many years working for United Grain Growers and the Western Canadian Grain Growers Association lobbying the federal government to end


Why were canola yields down?

Has canola turned into a wimp or were 2012’s lacklustre western Canadian yields due to poor weather, diseases, insects and pushed rotations? The Manitoba Canola Growers Association (MCGA) hopes to find out later this month when it meets with the life science companies that produce new canola cultivars, MCGA director Ernie Sirski told the Keystone

Churchill port wraps up its shipping season

Grain shipments through Churchill have fallen this year, but officials say they’re encouraged because the port attracted new customers and shipped a greater variety of products. “It was a successful year,” but “probably not as successful as we would have liked it to be,” said Jeff McEachern, executive director of the Churchill Gateway Development Corporation.


India on track to produce surplus wheat for the sixth year in a row

India, which is also the world’s biggest consumer of grain after China, produced a record 93.9 million tonnes in 2012

India looks likely to harvest a bumper crop of wheat in 2013, its sixth in a row to exceed demand, after late monsoon rains replenished soil moisture, strengthening prospects for exports from the world’s second-biggest producer for a second year. Annual monsoon rains picked up after a slow start in June, prompting Farm Minister Sharad

Short canola supplies force buyers to be creative

There has been little uptake in new milling wheat, durum and barley contracts, which puts their futures in doubt

Steady demand provided canola futures on the ICE Canada platform with plenty of support during the week ended Oct. 26. Much of the demand was associated with the emergence of fresh Chinese buying interest, with at least three cargoes of Canadian canola purchased by the country. There were hints that additional sales were made, but


Farmers complain about problems delivering grain to CWB

CWB vice-president of grain procurement Gord Flaten says it’s mostly just growing pains and the system will work

Some grain handlers are refusing to accept CWB grain deliveries and promising better grades to farmers who bypass the new voluntary board, farmers said during a recent conference call with CWB officials Oct. 17. During the conference-call meeting with more than 3,200 farmers, an Alberta producer (who identified himself only as John) said elevator employees

Japanese seek assurances of continued wheat quality

Satoru Koyajima likes the quality of the Canadian durum, but wonders if it will be there in the future. “We are a little bit concerned now that the Canadian Wheat Board is not operating as it used to,” he said through a translator. But the research and development leader with Japan’s largest pasta producer has