ALGIERS- The bill of cereal imports (wheat, maize and barley) dropped by more than 18% over the first ten months of 2016, despite an increase in the imported quantities, the Algerian Customs told APS.
The cereal imports bill fell by USD2.31 billion between January and October 2016, against USD2.85 over the same period in 2015, that is, a drop by 18.62%.
Imports recorded a slight rise as it reached 11.28 million tonnes (Mt) against 11.20 Mt (+0.7%), said the National Centre for Statistics and Data Processing (CNIS).
The cereals which increased in terms of quantity are hard wheat and barley, while soft wheat and maize which decreased.
Wheat (hard and soft) imports bill fell to USD1.51 billion from USD1.97 billion (-23.2%) in 2015, while there was a slight rise in terms of quantity (+0.11%), to 6.93 Mt from 6.92 mt.
Soft wheat imports bill dropped to USD1.03 billion from USD1.38 billion (-25.8%), while the imported quantities decreased to 5.34 Mt from 5.65 Mt (-5.53%).
Hard wheat bill declined to USD489.23 million from USD590.32 million (-17.12%), with a rise in imported quantities which stood at 1.6 Mt against 1.27 Mt (+25.2%) in 2015.
Maize imports dropped to USD665.08 million against USD722.27 million (-7.92%) as the volume of imports fell to 3.57 Mt from 3.60 Mt (-0.8%).
Algeria imported USD135.54 million of barley against USD150.26 million (-9.8%), while quantities fells to 767.734 t from 667.819 t (+14.96%).
Source: Cereals: Bill down, quantity up
