Good harvest is expected

This year autumn wheat is harvested on 1.1 million hectares of land in Hungary. According to György Czerván, secretary of state in the Ministry of Agriculture, average yield will be around 4.6 tons per hectare but others think that 5 tons per hectare is also possible. Cereal and rapeseed harvest is forecasted to reach the excellent level of last year, and will probably be much higher than the average of the last few years. Total autumn wheat harvest is estimated to be 5 million tons or even more this year. This is practically the same volume as last year and this means that 2-2.5 million tons of autumn wheat will be available for selling. Zsófia Pótsa, general secretary of the Hungarian Grain and Seed Association (MGTKSZ), told our magazine that there would be enough cereal for domestic use and export too. A lot depends on prices, when the harvest started prices were between HUF 43,000-45,000 a ton. The secretary added that there is also good yield in other parts of the world where they are harvesting at the moment. Agricultural Economics Research Institute (AKI) director Norbert Potori informed us that after last year’s record global harvest 1-2 percent less wheat is to be harvested, but this will entail no price increase. When the harvest started in Hungary farmers were complaining that purchase prices were too low. Trade organisations opined that farmers should wait and only sell later. However, storage might be a problem. The National Association of Farmers Societies and Cooperatives (MAGOSZ) and the Hungarian Chamber of Agriculture (NAK) told farmers to join forces because this way it would be easier for them to store in state grain warehouses. Our magazine also got to know that the majority of Hungarian mills have financing problems because last year their buying strategy didn’t work out and they had to purchase HUF 50,000-60,000/ton wheat to make flour. József Vancsura, president of Grain Producer’s Association – Hungary (GOSZ), is of the opinion that total grain harvest will be around 7 million tons. Béla Mártonffy, president of FruitVeb, Hungary’s Interprofessional Organisation for Fruit and Vegetable, opined that a good medium harvest is expected in the fruit and vegetable sector. More and better quality domestic watermelon and cantaloupe will be put on the market this year in Hungary. After last year’s 210,000-ton yield a 5-10 percent increase is expected. In July and August Hungary will be the biggest exporter in Europe, selling half of our watermelon and cantaloupe harvest abroad.