EU: Malt export licence fixations to-date show changed sources of exports

Malt export licence fixations to-date show a large plus for Belgium versus last year, increases also for the Netherlands and Sweden, and much reduced figures for France, Germany and the U.K. These figures are an indication of changed sources of exports, not exact though, because certificates are freely usable all over the community, market analysts have recently commented.

Inside multinational groups, especially between France and Belgium, export licences booked in one country are probably also used in the other one. But nevertheless there is a message: seaboard maltsters gain volume in the export business. For many maltsters in the inland it can only mean to follow the path shown by their British colleagues and concentrate more on domestic markets. But also there the increasing cost of traffic and the unreliability of water levels in the big rivers make sales over long distances less attractive.