South Africa imported 1,475 tonnes of white maize last week, the first time in years it has done so, data from the South African Grain Information Service showed on Tuesday. The shipment came from Zambia and Malawi, while exports of the staple totalled 4,800 tonnes.
South Africa faces a huge maize harvest deficit this season. Yellow maize exports dropped to 1,151 tonnes from 983 the previous week and imports from Argentina stood at 17,795 tonnes from 25,977 a week, SAGIS said shortly after the market closed.
July white maize ended 1.65 percent down at 1,673 rand a tonne following the trend in the United States, a dealer said. "I think it was technical trading more than anything else. I think America being down on the electronic trading helped it come down," the trader said.
"1,701 was a key level yesterday. We closed below that so we had quite a negative close. Maybe there was some panic because we closed below that level." July white maize jumped to a record high of 2,046 rand in March after officials said this season's harvest could come up well short of the 8 million tonnes South Africans consume each year.
South Africa is forecast to produce around 7.05 million tonnes of maize in 2006/07, which would create a shortfall of nearly one million tonnes. About two million tonnes of carry-over stocks could help prevent a shortage.
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