Sunflower oil prices in Ukraine drop to 6-month low: Refinitiv
Export prices for crude sunflower oil from Ukraine plummeted on 17 June 2021, when offer prices lost around USD 100 per ton in one day, Refinitiv Agriculture writes.
Analysts explained that extremely low external demand coupled with falling soybean oil prices had caused Ukrainian sunflower oil prices to fall to a 6-month low.
"Ukrainian sunflower oil offers for July-August fell to 1140-1170 USD/t FOB Chornomorsk on June 17, 2021, down from 1230-1250 USD/t a day earlier. By the end of the day, some market sources reported supply prices falling even lower to 1060-1070 USD/t FOB, trying to draw buyer interest," the experts said.
Sunflower oil prices in Ukraine reached a 5-year high of 1700 USD/t FOB in March 2021.
External demand for sunflower oil has been very low in recent months due to soaring prices.
Related: Crushing plants in Ukraine halt sunflowerseeds procurement on slack export demand
The sunflower oil producers association, Ukroilprom, reported earlier this week that Ukraine's sunflower oil exports totalled 4.42 million t in the first 8 months of the 2020/21 season (September-August), compared to 5.22 mln t in Sep-May 2020.
Analysts noted that the shipment of sunflower oil from Ukraine intensified during May and June, with a large number of sellers on the market.
"Sunflower oil stocks in Ukrainian ports are around 400,000 t, which is no large volume, but it has also put pressure on prices, given the extremely low export interest," experts summed up.
As a reminder, the Health Ministry of Ukraine adopted the maximum permissible levels for chlorpyrifos and chlorpyrifos-methyl in agricultural products and foodstuffs, including sunflower and sunflower oil.
