It has been the busiest week of the year for grain price announcements.

Tirlán announced base prices of €210/t for green feed barley and €220/t for green feed wheat with many growers achieving a €10/t trading bonus with these prices.

Dairygold announced a base price of €213/t for green feed barley and €223/t for green feed wheat with a €5/t bonus added on for many growers.

The full list of prices is available in this week's paper. Boortmalt suppliers were also informed of their price in recent days. It is understood to be €217.70/t, once levies and charges are taken away.

Many farmers are no doubt unhappy with these prices, but they are probably fairly representative of the market unfortunately, and are among record grain prices.

However, despite being among record grain prices, this is now the territory that prices are in and are not high enough to deal with the rising cost of inputs which are a huge challenge. The lack of premium payments for grain is another and the decline in demand for malting barley has seen the commodity drop below feed barley.

Drinks sector

However, if the drinks sector wants to continue to use the Irish brand, then malting barley cannot be treated like a commodity. A value has to be put on Irish or farmers will not grow the crop anymore.

Most would have been better off growing a higher yielding feeding barley this year.

Trends

The Matif wheat price for December has been on a downward trend over the past month.

On 2 September, that price hit a peak of €256.75/t. On Monday, it hit its lowest point of the month at €233.25/t and, on Wednesday afternoon, it had come back up to €239.25/t.

Corn was down overall and was at €267/t on Wednesday afternoon, while French oilseed rape was at €540.25/t.

That’s down from the last few volatile weeks. November 2027 oilseed rape prices on the Matif market have been trending up over the past month and on Wednesday afternoon that price was at €533.75/t. Look out for selling opportunities. Oilseed rape was the best paying crop for many this year and growers might do well to sell some of the crop forward while prices are still at high levels.

MARS Bulletin

The EU Commission released its crop monitoring in Europe report this week and grain maize yield was reported to be down 8% on the five-year average and was revised down 2% from last month’s report. Spring barley yield was forecast up 1% on the five-year average in the report.

In the US, 18% of corn is estimated to be harvested with 57% of the crop in good or excellent condition. Twenty seven percent of winter wheat is reported to be planted, while 17% of soybeans are harvested.