PARIS: European Union soft wheat exports since the start of the 2024/25 season in July reached 12.18 million metric tons by Jan. 26, up compared to 11.74 million the previous week, but down 37% from a year earlier, European Commission data showed on Tuesday.

However, the Commission said export data for Italy has been incomplete for the past seven weeks. For France, data has been incomplete since the beginning of 2024, while export data for Bulgaria and Ireland has been incomplete since the beginning of the 2023/24 marketing year. A breakdown of this season’s volumes showed Romania was still the largest EU soft wheat exporter, with 3.38 million tons so far, followed by Lithuania with 1.78 million tons, Latvia with 1.57 million tons, Germany with 1.38 million tons and France with 1.35 million tons. Competition from Black Sea supplies and a poor harvest in France have curbed EU exports this season, though the trend has been amplified by the missing data.