Australia's wheat and meslin exports increased in November from both a month and year earlier, and could continue to rise into 2022 following a bumper harvest. This helped take the country's January-November shipments to 23.45mn, almost triple the same period in 2020, according to trade data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) supplied through GTT. Australia shipped 1.63mn t of wheat and meslin in November, compared with 1.44mn t in October and just 505,000t in November 2020. The rise in November shipments compared with October was driven by higher exports to China, Indonesia and the Philippines, which more than offset declines in sales to Japan, South Korea and Vietnam. January-November shipments to China nearly doubled from the same period in 2020. Exports increased despite record-high rainfall in November that impeded harvesting, reduced crop quality and created logistics issues in the country, as demand remained strong. Australian wheat markets are still very illiquid this week, with market participants just getting back to their desks after the festive break. Bids to growers have fallen by $4-5 this week, with large traders not showing any rush to own and carry this massive crop.
The Australian wheat industry is export oriented, shipping about 65-75pc of the nation's total production to more than 50 countries. The majority of Australian wheat is exported in bulk cargoes with the top 10 importing countries accounting for 70-80pc of exports. Mills are reporting good quality milling wheat out of Queensland to start the year, as this was harvested before it really started to rain. It is unclear how much of this quality wheat will be held by domestic consumers rather than exported.