EU: The EU barley crop of more than 60 million tonnes will produce – on paper – a surplus of 7.2 million tonnes. Feed use will decline from 40.2 to 37.6 million tonnes, because more feed wheat is available than last year. Export licences booked in July/August are a mere 82,000 tonnes. Larger exports would only be possible a) with restitutions b) if the Euro declines against the US Dollar c) if world markets become much firmer. At present all these options look unlikely so that major sales to intervention must be expected.

A month ago the EU expected a huge crop of excellent quality barley. The crop size is still the same, but qualities are very good mainly on the Continent. Ireland, the U.K., Scandinavia and the Baltic countries had to battle against adverse weather since weeks so that some of their malting barleys show damages viz. sprouting, splits, fusarium and will be downgraded to feed barley. It is the opposite situation of last year, when we had the best crop results in Northern Europe.

Spain gathered a large crop with a good share of malting barley. Selection nevertheless is problematic, as protein contents are low, partly too low (less than 9 %), particularly in the South of the country.

U.K.: Winter barley has been gathered in good quality. Spring barley harvest advanced slowly, constantly interrupted by rains, which led to damages, where ripe fields could not be combined. Harvest is now virtually finished in England and in the Borders, Scotland has cut approx. 50 %. The expected export surplus has dwindled to rather small quantities. U.K. industries will use all their available winter barleys.

Denmark: The average estimate is that one third of the crop is still in the fields. A pessimistic view is that this barley may not be of malting quality, however, forecast sunny and dry weather early September will enable farmers to gather the rest of the crop under favourable conditions.

Northern Europe: It is impossible today to present a clear picture of the malting barley supplies. Remind you that the U.K. and Scandinavia also reported receivals of good qualities, where they were not at all expected. Therefore the next few weeks will tell the truth.

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