The government may buy 2 million tons of grain from farmers "starting this fall" to support prices, Aram Gukasyan, deputy chief executive of state trader United Grain Co., said at the Black Sea Grain and Oilseeds conference Thursday.
The country could export 23.5 million tons of grain in the 12 months that started July 1, Russian Grain Union president Arkady Zlochevsky said at the conference. The grain crop may come to 90.3 million tons.
Director of the ProZerno consultancy Vladimir Petrichenko said farmers might reap a record harvest of 8.31 million tons of sunflower seeds, 1.28 million tons of soybeans and 1.13 million tons of rapeseeds. Russia may face a shortage of sunflower-processing plants, and may export more than 500,000 tons of seeds despite a 20 percent duty.
(Bloomberg)