Kazakhstan, Astana, Sept. 7 / Trend A.Maratov /
The planned partial subsidization of transport costs for the grain export creates favorable conditions to promote the Kazakh grain to the Egyptian market, the Kazakh Agriculture Ministry's Agriculture and Plant Protection Department Director, Anna Buts, said in an interview with Trend.
"The Kazakh wheat is less competitive in Egypt's grain market due to the high transport costs, which is linked with Kazakhstan's geographical location. The Russian Federation in 2010 imposed a ban on grain export and Ukraine set quotas on the grain export and due to this Kazakhstan was able to ship 467,500 tons of grain to Egypt," Buts said.
She said the Russian grain usually has high competitiveness on the market due to lower transportation costs and shorter delivery time, compared to the American and Australian grain. In addition, the Egyptian market is important for such major wheat exporters like the U.S., France and Australia.
Buts said Egypt is one of the leaders in the wheat consumption per capita in the world and is among five world wheat importers.
"The country's total wheat consumption is growing faster than production due to the population growth. So, Egypt does not have an opportunity to reduce imports of wheat, which stands at an average of 7 million tons per year or about 50 percent of consumption," she said.
Kazakhstan intends to export wheat and grain in the amount of 8-9 million tons in this marketing year. Kazakhstan's grain export, including flour in grain equivalent, is projected at 8-9 million tons in 2011-2012 marketing year.
The grain harvest is projected at 18 million tons in Kazakhstan in 2011. Based on the forecast of the International Grains Council, the world's total yield of wheat in 2011-2012 will amount to 674 million tons, which exceeds last year's volume (651 million tons) by 23 million tons.