Maize crop biggest since 1982

Cape Town - With two weeks left of the current maize marketing season, farmers have already delivered 11.394m tons of mealies to silos - 6.617m tons of white maize and 4.777m tons of yellow maize.

This information is contained in the South African Grain Information Service's weekly newsletter.

Last week maize farmers delivered 11 000 tons of maize to silos, compared with 8 000 tons the previous week.

The delivery to silos brings the size of the crop closer to the anticipated 11.63m tons for delivery, reports Reuters.

The National Crop Estimates Committee has estimated that the total maize crop for the current season will be 12.96m tons, which is almost 1m tons more than the previous season's 12.05m tons.

The current season's crop would appear to be the biggest since the 1981/82 record, when 14.42m tons of maize were produced in South Africa.

Successive bumper maize crops have contributed to recent pressure on prices. On Wednesday the July contract for white maize was trading at R1 090 per ton on Safex, which represents a more than 30% decline this year.

- Sake24.com

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