Farmers in Argentina sold a record volume of soyabeans – more than 13.7M tonnes – in September, following the government’s introduction of a special exchange rate for producers, according to a report by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA).
Announced by the Argentine government on 4 September, the special temporary exchange rate of 200 Argentine pesos/US$1 was introduced for soyabean exports from 5-30 September.
“This [the special exchange rate] raised the peso-denominated price of soyabeans in the local market by 38% practically overnight,” the USDA’s 11 October Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS)’s Global Agricultural Information Network (GAIN) report said.
As a result, exporters made almost 4M tonnes in export declarations, with China the principal destination, according to the report.
The USDA raised soyabean exports for 2021/22 to 5.5M tonnes and reduced projected crushing to 37.5M tonnes.
Soyabean ending stocks were lowered to 5.7M tonnes, which was the lowest level since 2012/13.
For 2022/23, production was lowered to 49M tonnes, due to lower than anticipated area switching from corn to soyabeans.
However, farmers could still make changes if dry weather persisted, the report said.
The USDA estimated that a soyabean planted area of 16.85M ha in 2022/23 would represent an increase of 600,000ha over revised and lowered totals for 2021/22 and would reverse a downward trend in Argentina’s soyabean area over the last five years.
The sunflower planted area in 2022/23 was reduced by 100,000ha to 1.9M ha due to dry conditions in northern Argentina, lowering total production to 3.8M tonnes. This would still represent an increase of 13% compared to the previous year.
Political considerations continued to affect farmers, the report said, and the recent boom in soyabeans combined with elections in 2023, meant that farm sales of all commodities were likely to slow down until August 2023, when farmers would see the results of primary elections.
“If the conservative opposition performs well, farmers are likely to hold onto as much grain and oilseeds as possible, hoping that a change of government in December 2023 could result in the end of currency controls and potentially lower export taxes,” the report said.
“In contrast, a stronger than expected performance by the ruling coalition in August 2023 could mean that farmers would begin selling in earnest to avoid any new taxes imposed by a re-energised Peronist government.”
Soyabeans and their by-products, soyabean meal and soyabean oil, account for more than half of Argentina’s exports and in recent years have accounted for almost two-thirds, according to the report.
