USA: Movement of barley off farm still slow

Steady market prices and not much barley moving to markets – these are things Marvin Zutz, Minnesota Barley Growers Association executive director, has grown accustomed to expect in recent months. But the USDA planting intentions report that was issued at the end of March was surprising to him, The Prairie Star reported on May 17.

“I was fairly impressed with the numbers that came out, both for Minnesota and North Dakota,” Zutz said, referring to the planned number of barley acres. “The numbers were stronger than what I was led to believe going into that report. But they may come in a little lower now with the late spring we are having.”

Minnesota growers actually indicated they were going to plant 11 percent more barley in 2014, with 100,000 planned. Meanwhile across the border, North Dakota producers were expecting to plant 650,000 acres, a decrease of 14 percent.

Canadians are also looking at lower barley acres. Statistics Canada is expecting 6.3 million acres of barley will be planted this year, down from 7.08 million last year and 7.4 million in 2012. Only a decade ago, Canadian farmers seeded nearly 11 million acres of barley.

Movement of barley off the farm is still slow, Zutz noted. Earlier this year the slow movement was due largely to the lack of rail service, but now other factors like road restrictions, soft country roads and farm yards and farmers getting things ready to start fieldwork are hampering grain movement as well.

“The only other news concerning barley is the fact we can’t get it in the ground,” he said. “It’s getting late, but most growers will stick to their original acres, because most of them are contracted acres.

“In addition, for most growers the barley acres are small and it won’t be a problem for them to get the crop in really quick once the conditions become right.”

The fact that most barley, at least in Minnesota, is now contracted for malting barley, leaves very little to be marketed on the cash market, Zutz noted.

Barley prices received by North Dakota farmers trended lower during April according to the National Ag Statistics Services Ag Price report for April. The preliminary April feed barley price was pegged at $3.50 a bushel, down 15 cents from March and a 44-cent decline was noted for malting barley, which was listed at $5.50 a bushel. That compares, respectively, to $5.40 and $6.64 a bushel that was received in April 2013.

With the large amount of last year’s contracted malting crop still to be moved into the system, there is little activity in the cash malting barley market. The feed barley market is also pretty quiet, with little news on the feed barley export scene, he said.

Checking local elevator cash board prices, the average price for malting barley remained the same at $4.25 a bushel, while the average feed barley price was in the neighborhood of $3.35 a bushel, which was up about a dime during the past two weeks.

21 May, 2014