The institute puts this year’s corn and sorghum harvest at 10.6 million tons, up 30% on the previous year. The Agriculture Ministry (MADR) says its data are closer to the data the traders have. Where does this difference stem from?
“The MADR data are preliminary data and Cocereal’s are projections. As a result, these data are not official and they are subject to change. Under the circumstances, we believe that the Agriculture Ministry’s and Cocereal’s data almost match. The official data are published by the National Statistics Institute and Eurostat,” say the officials of the Ministry of Agriculture, who put this year’s corn crop at 11.5 million tons.
On the other hand, Gabriel Barbalau, general manager of United Grain Group, a top ten grain trader, says that some of the differences stem from the fact that small farmers do not accurately report their entire output.
“The difference comes from the amounts in peasants’ yards, in subsistence and semi-subsistence farms. The amounts are not registered anywhere because farmers do not usually provide data about this output to the Agriculture Ministry or to the Finance Ministry, either,” Barbalau explains.
The trader says that the difference between the reporting of producers and the reality out there can be even greater than 1 million tons. “Other sources say that this year’s corn crop is actually 20 million tons. The great advantage here is that Romania will be able to use these amounts next summer, considering 2012 looks like it will be a slow agricultural year.”
The 20 million tons would put Romania on the top position among corn producers in the European Union, as well as among the top five on this market worldwide.
Romania, which harvested corn from 2.5 million hectares would thus leave behind countries like Mexico, Argentina and Ukraine, and be behind China and the United States, whose output exceeds 200 million tons a year. A 20 million ton crop would translate into EUR3.6 billion collected by farmers, ZF has calculated, taking into account corn quotes on international markets.
Even with 11.4 million tons, the farmers that bet on corn still stand to collect EUR2 billion this year. The about one million ton difference is worth some EUR150 million.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)