EU & UK: Barley crop development still hampered by unfavourable weather

Unfavourable weather continues to hamper crop 2024 development in Europe, RMI Analytics said in their late April report.

A break in rainfall over the past two weeks allowed planting in France to advance, at 96% complete (normally 100%). However, the wet conditions across Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and the UK (Scotland) continue to delay seeding and cool temperatures are slowing early crop development. As a result, the analysts’ barley crop forecast for EU-27 + UK is down slightly, at 59.6 mln tonnes.

EU barley price direction is upward, mainly due to the late start to crop 2024. Demand is quiet with little crop 2023 left to sell and a higher uncertainty for crop 2024 is reducing farmer selling which is not expected to change until planting is complete.

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