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Prices driving more customers to Brazilian corn

An ag consultant says weak Brazilian currency could help it surpass the U.S. as the largest global corn exporter.

Angie Setzer with Consus tells Brownfield U.S. corn exports have been underwhelming.

“What really drives prices is going to be demand, specifically Chinese demand, and so far, we’re just not seeing that pick up,” she explains.

Meanwhile, she says recent phytosanitary agreements between Brazil and China have increased their deliveries by, “a million and a half metric tons in the month of December, another million or so in the month of January, and is looking at taking another dab in February,” she says.

Setzer says the buying power of international customers also remains limited.

“I think you’re starting to see some spillover effects of some of the poorer countries out there or some of the countries that are struggling with limited buying power,” she says.

She says if Brazil can produce a decent second corn crop, extremely cheap corn will likely enter the market around July.

USDA has raised its forecast for Brazilian corn exports to 50 million metric tons for the 2022-23 marketing year, while the U.S. is projected to export 48.9 million tons.