Due to increase in crushing, the outstanding stock of soybean is expected to decrease.
13-Sep-2024 12:26 PM
Indore. The latest report of the apex body of soybean industry - Soybean Processors Association of India (SOPA) shows that in the first 11 months of the current marketing season i.e. from October 2023 to August 2024,
the total crushing of soybean in the country increased to 113 lakh tonnes, which was 5.50 lakh tonnes more than the quantity of 107.50 lakh tonnes in the same period of 2022-23 season. According to the report, during the 2023-24 season,
the total availability of soybean (for crushing) reached 135.81 lakh tonnes, including the production of 118.74 lakh tonnes, imports of 6 lakh tonnes and previous outstanding stock, while in the 2022-23 season it had reached 143.29 lakh tonnes.
Due to low availability and more crushing, the outstanding stock of soybean for the marketing season 2024-25 is estimated to decrease to around 11.16 lakh tonnes from 24 lakh tonnes at the beginning of 2023-24.
Due to more crushing of soybean, the domestic production of soymeal also increased to 89.17 lakh tonnes in the current marketing season of 2023-24, which had reached only 85.80 lakh tonnes in the season 2022-23.
During the period under review, the export of soymeal from India also increased from 17.30 lakh tonnes to 20.77 lakh tonnes.
Exports increased despite the price of Indian soymeal being $ 100-150 per tonne higher than other countries. Its demand remained very strong in some other countries including Iran and Bangladesh.
Between October 2023 and August 2024, 61 lakh tonnes of soymeal is expected to be consumed in animal feed production, which is slightly less than the previous season.
Similarly, its consumption for food purposes also declined marginally to 7.40 lakh tonnes. During October-August, India exported 4.12 lakh tonnes of soymeal to Iran, 3.03 lakh tonnes to Bangladesh, 1.91 lakh tonnes to Nepal and 1.07 lakh tonnes to Germany.
September is the last month of the 2023-24 season and when its data comes out, it will be known what was the status of production, processing and export of soybean and soymeal during the entire marketing season.