09/13/06 World wheat stocks tighten

Farm and Ranch September 13, 2006 USDA did not make any changes in U.S. wheat production numbers in reports issued Tuesday. A final report on small grain production for 2006 will be issued later this month. In the supply and demand report USDA did increase food use for wheat which dropped U.S. ending stocks next May by five million bushels to 429 million. On the world wheat scene Mike Kruger of The Money Farm near Fargo, North Dakota, says a key number was USDA's forecast for the Australian wheat crop. Kruger: "USDA had started carrying their crop a few months ago as high as 23 million tons. Last month they were at 21.5 million. Today they dropped that production down to 195 million tons. Most private analysts we talk to have been using numbers in that 16-18 million ton range. So the USDA I think looking at their numbers probably a little bit conservative leaving it at 19.5." Kruger says USDA also played it conservative in its estimate for Argentina where dryness has also been a problem. Overall world wheat production and ending stocks were cut by two million tons down to 126 million. Kruger: "Which puts those at the smallest they have been in over 25 years. And some people suggest that world wheat ending supplies on a stocks to use ratio are the smallest they have been since USDA started its data base back in 1960." I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.