Australia: Barley production forecast unchanged at 11.4 mln tonnes

Heavy rains in the south east of Australia and parts of Western Australia are worrisome as harvest tries to advance and quality implications need to be closely monitored, RMI Analytics said in their early December report.

Reassuring is the much better than average result in the already harvested Queensland and northern New South Wales, especially where malting barley selection rates are much better than normal.

Overall, with barley production forecast unchanged at 11.4 mln tonnes, there should be 3.0-3.5 mln tonnes of malting barley quality available, at a time when demand is lower, both domestically and in export trade.

A US/China trade conflict may be supportive to export demand. Mexico has been a key market for Australia over the past two years, but now the pace of exports is slowing, as demand eases and local regional supply has improved.