Market News & Headlines >> Record Corn Crop In Ukraine Boosts Exports

U.S. corn is facing stronger-than-expected export competition from Ukrainian corn during the current 2018/19 marketing year due to larger-than-expected production in that country. 

Ukraine’s acting agriculture minister on Tuesday raised the 2018 corn crop forecast to an all-time record high of 34.8 million metric tons from a previous estimate of 34.0 million tons. The new estimate is 1.3 million tons above USDA’s current estimate of the country’s crop, suggesting USDA may have to revise its estimates of Ukraine’s production and exports upward a bit further. 

USDA in its Nov. 8 Supply/Demand report already raised its estimate of Ukraine’s corn production by 2.5 million tons to 33.5 million and also raised projected Ukrainian corn exports by 2 million tons to 27 million. 

Through Nov. 21, Ukraine had exported 4.4 million tons of corn since the start of its 2018/19 marketing year, which started on July 1, compared with only 2.6 million tons during the same period a year earlier, Ukraine’s agriculture ministry said on Thursday.