PARIS (Reuters) – The United Nations food agency’s world price index fell for a fifth month in a row in August, further from all-time highs hit earlier this year, as a resumption of grain exports from Ukrainian ports contributed to improved supply prospects.
The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said on Friday that its price index https://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/foodpricesindex/en/, which tracks the most globally traded food commodities, averaged 138.0 points last month versus a revised 140.7 for July.
The July figure was previously put at 140.9.
The index has fallen from a record of 159.7 in March, hit after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The August reading was, however, 7.9% higher than a year earlier.
FAO’s cereal price index fell 1.4% month-on-month in August, with the re-opening of Ukrainian Black Sea ports under a diplomatic deal as well as favourable wheat harvest prospects in North America and Russia weighing on prices, the agency said.
But the maize price index rose 1.5% last month as hot, dry weather reduced the outlook for production in Europe and the United States, it said.
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The vegetable oil, sugar, dairy and meat price indices all fell, partly reflecting improved supplies.
In separate cereal supply and demand estimates https://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/csdb/en/, FAO lowered its forecast for global cereal production in 2022 to 2.774 billion tonnes from a previous projection of 2.792 billion in early July.
That is 1.4% below estimated output for 2021.
The cut to its prediction for 2022 cereal production was due to the weather-reduced corn prospects in the northern hemisphere, with European Union yields notably seen falling 16% below their five-year average, FAO said.
World cereal use in 2022/23 is expected to surpass production at 2.792 million tonnes, leading to a projected 2.1% fall in global stocks compared with 2021/22 to 845 million tonnes.
That would represent a stocks-to-use ratio of 29.5%, down from 30.9% in 2021/22 but still relatively high historically, FAO said.
(Reporting by Gus Trompiz; editing by Jason Neely and Edwina Gibbs)