Russia, Kazakhstan linseed exports to surge, Oil World forecasts

Russian linseed exports are forecast to climb 84 percent to 280,000 metric tons from 152,000 tons in 2010-11 and 71,000 tons in 2009-10, while Kazakhstan's shipments will more than triple to 200,000 tons from 60,000 tons in 2010-11 and 30,000 tons two years ago, the Hamburg-based researcher said in a weekly report released yesterday, Bloomberg reports.  

Canadian exports of linseed, or flaxseed, to the European Union, the biggest buyer, slumped after the bloc in 2009 found shipments with unauthorized genetically modified seed. Canada's exports of the oilseed slumped to 359,000 tons last year from 705,000 tons in 2010, according to Oil World.

"Farmers in the Black Sea countries apparently made use of the tightened world linseed production outlook and expanded the linseed cultivation," Oil World wrote. "The latter was also accompanied by rising demand from the EU, partly due to the growing risk of importing genetically modified linseed from Canada."

Russia, Kazakhstan and Ukraine are forecast to jointly export 510,000 tons of linseed in the year through July, more than double the 237,000 tons a year earlier and compared with about 1,000 tons a decade ago, according to Oil World.

Production in the three Black Sea countries is estimated at 618,000 tons in 2011-12, up from 322,000 tons a year earlier.