French cereal exports are in sharp decline. Algeria and Morocco, two of the largest wheat importers, have turned their backs on France in favor of Russia, thus shaking up the situation for French production.
Agreste, the statistics service of the Ministry of Agriculture, announced, in a note published on November 14, 2023, that the French agri-food trade surplus in September 2023 had reached 579 million euros, a drop of 377 million euros compared to September 2022.
Thus, “ the decline in cereal exports continues to weigh on the balance of gross agricultural products ”, which fell to 133 million euros in September 2023, a drop of 268 million euros over one year. Nearly 60% of this decline is due to the deterioration of trade with third countries.
Algeria and Morocco opt for Russian wheat
Agreste indicates that cereal exports are falling by 37% in value, after the price surge in 2022. Sales of cereals, mainly soft wheat, fell by 310 million euros compared to September 2022. The French Ministry of Agriculture Agriculture explains this decline by “The drop in exports of raw products is based, for its part, more than 95% on the reduction in sales of cereals, mainly to Algeria and Egypt. “.
France is thus losing important customers. It is replaced in the countries of North Africa by Russia. Indeed, Algeria has become the second buyer of Russian wheat during the summer of 2023. “ Algeria maintains its second place in the volume of imports (of Russian wheat) over the last two months ”, indicated to the Sputnik agency,
FranceAgriMer, the specialist council for “major cereal crops-markets” underlines, in its latest report, that Algerian imports of French soft wheat had recorded a clear decline. At the end of October 2023, Algeria had imported a quantity of 157,000 tonnes of French soft wheat, while in the same period of 2022, the quantity imported by the OAIC was 1.05 million tonnes.
For Morocco, even if France remains in the lead, Russia, the world’s leading wheat exporter, is making a notable return to the local wheat supplier scene, nibbling away at shares of the French market. Russia should maintain its shipments to the Kingdom and gradually replace France, the kingdom’s historic supplier.
