Hamburg-based oilseed analyst Oil World raised slightly its estimate of the European Union's 2007 rapeseed harvest to 17.45 million tonnes on Tuesday, up from 17.41 million seen last month and 8 percent higher than 2006. Market talk has suggested that this year's crop could be as low as 16.8 million tonnes. But Oil World dismissed this.
"This year's rapeseed production is not as poor as several market observers assumed during the past weeks," the analyst said, stressing that the EU-27 output would be 1.4 million tonnes higher than in 2006. "A sin the area by 17 percent to 6.3 million hectares would have allowed a much bigger production under favourable conditions to close to 19 million tonnes; but this was prevented by poor weather," the analyst said.
Oil World put the German rapeseed crop at 5.23 million tonnes this season, down 100,000 tonnes from 2006/2007, stressing that it considered the official estimate of 5.3 million tonnes "too high". The rapeseed harvest is completed almost everywhere in Europe.
Oil World said it expected an increase in EU rapeseed consumption due to high demand to make biodiesel and food products. This would lead to a significant decline in stocks to 900,000 tonnes at the end of June, despite imports in the bloc around 700,000 tonnes.