A heat wave in Russia has caused some problems for sugar beet planted late in the season, but most of the crop has not been affected, an industry official said. "In general where we sowed late it's affected by the heat,but where it was sown in good time it seems normal for the time being," Mikhail Sushkov, head of Russia's Sugar Beet Seed Association Semsvekla, said. "Of course the great heat is influencing the sugar beet, but it's not yet so serious and if the rains come then the situation will soon right itself," he said.

Sushkov said he had recently visited the Lipetsk region in the black earth area of central Russia, and there seemed to be no problems with the outlook for beet. It was still too early to comment on the quality of the crop, he said, adding that beet testing would start in July but no date had yet been set.

Korea corn body invites tenders

The Korea Corn Processing Industry Association (KOCOPIA) of South Korea has invited tenders tobuy 157,500 tonnes of US No.2 yellow corn. The association was seeking the US corn under the export credit guarantees, but suppliers could also offer other origins with notes for availability of shipper's usance, they said.

A shipper's usance is a guarantee for financing trade deals by suppliers or supplier's banks. The tenders were split into three lots of 52,500 tonnes each.

White sugar prices to rise

White sugar looks like starring among the soft commodities this week while LIFFE coffee and cocoa futures are expected to remain under pressure.

Although white sugar prices, which have held relatively steady compared with collapsing raws, retreated on Friday after a sharp advance on Thursday, they could gain further ground this week, traders and analysts said. "We see this as the fruition of two months basing," said Adrian Haylor, technical analyst at Sucden.

Haylor said he expected near August to break resistance at $262.40 and then press on to $270.50. "We see no reason why this level cannot break within the next couple of weeks," he said. Traders said whites were a better buy than raws as reflected in the August/July whites premium widening at one stage to $90 a tonne, from $70 the previous week.

Hungary maize falls

Prices of maize futures eased on the Budapest Commodities Exchange last week, under pressure from strong supply, slow wheat trade and worries of a lack of storage space, traders said. "The good maize weather as well as the slow export of wheat is probably making producers nervousness," said Balazs Orban, a broker with Agrograin.

Slower than expected sales of wheat could put storage space for all grains at a premium, Orban said. All maturities of maize except July eased by between 250 and 700 forints, with October closing at 16,000 forints and July, 1999 closing at 18,600 forints. Prices of euro wheat and milling wheat rose on speculation that the government would provide subsidies to farmers, traders said. All milling wheat contracts except January and March rose bybetween 20 and 170 forints. August closed up 50 forints at 18,650.

Zimbabwe maize meal prices rise

Zimbabwe's private millers defied a government plea by raising maize meal prices by 12 percent after the state Grain Marketing Board (GMB) lifted maize prices, the Herald newspaper reported last week. "By increasing the price, millers have effectively turned down an impassioned plea by government not to hike the price of the country's staple food since the days of the food riots in January," the paper said.

The GMB raised maize prices by 8.5 percent. No comment was immediately available from the Millers Association or the Small Scale Millers Association of Zimbabwe. Six people died in the January riots, Zimbabwe's worst since independence from Britain in 1980. The riots were precipitated by a 25 percent increase in maize meal prices.

Philippines needs to import sugar

The Philippines needs to import 200,000 tonnes of sugar this year because of increased demand from the local beverageindustry and prospects of a domestic shortfall in the next crop year due to dry weather, officials and industry executives said. "We are entering the international sugar market again (for the first time) since the 1995/1996 crop season," a source at the Sugar Regulatory Administration (SRA) said.

Heavy imports of cheaper sugar in 1995/1996 ending August 31 resulted in a glut, pushing down domestic raw sugar prices to a low of 480 pesos per 50 kg bag in late 1996 from 800 to 900 pesos at the start of that year. Prices have since recovered to 790 to 805 pesos through a government-supported buying programme. The government also banned the import of sugar, resulting in the mopping up of excess supplies.

Indonesia to import cooking oil

According to Indonesian government officials, the country may have to import cooking oil from Malaysia if local prices continue to rise and stocks diminish. "We may have to import cooking oil soon from Malaysia if local prices continue to rise and stocks diminish, butit will be the last resort," officials from the trade and industry ministry said.

"We will use the money taken from the 40 percent export taxon CPO to buy the cooking oil. We understand that local prices have increased because of the rupiah's falls, but we can also do a lot of other things, such as improving the distribution," he said.

Crude palm oil is processed into olein, which is used as cooking oil. Indonesia's CPO output is expected to stand at 5,616,000 tonnes this year. Malaysia is the world's largest producer. US may face grain storage problems US agriculture secretary Dan Glickman said there may be grain storage problems this fall in Kansas, but there appears to be ample space for the wheat harvest. "It looks like there is adequate space to handle the wheat harvest," Glickman said in a statement released in Washington.

"However, down the road, there is the potential for tight storage conditions as the fall crops are harvested," he said. Glickman is in Wichita, Kansas, visiting the site of agrain elevator explosion that killed five people. A grain elevator exploded a week ago at the DeBruce Grain facility in Wichita.

It was the third-largest grain elevator in the world and was storing seven million bushels of grain at the time of the explosion. Glickman said the USDA will take several measures to help ease storage problems.

Efforts on to boost US grain exports

Grain industry and transport officials urged the US agriculture secretary Dan Glickman to step up efforts to boost grain exports in order to avert storage and transport problems. The agriculture secretary met state, federal and private sector officials here following an inspection of the DeBruce Grain elevator which exploded on June 8, killing five workers. "We need to have markets to move this grain to," said Drew Collier, vice-president of agricultural products at Union Pacific Corp. "If we don't address this, we will have problems because the pipeline will not be able to handle it."

Officials told Glickman the loss of theDeBruce facility would disrupt grain handling more in the corn, soybean and sorghum harvests this fall than the wheat harvest, which just began last week in Kansas, the top wheat producing state. The DeBruce facility had in-store capacity of 20 million bushels in silos and room for another 18 million bushels for special on-ground storage, they said.

Subsidy war on the cards

The uropean Union (EU) had forced barley prices to their lowest levels in more than a decade through subsidised exports, the Australian Grain Marketing Federation (AGMF) said. Speaking on behalf of Australian barley exporters, AGMF chairman Robert Sewell condemned the current level of subsidy activity by the EU and said.

It could trigger a subsidy war between the US and Europe. Until March this year relatively low level subsidies in the EU had not totally destabilised world barley prices. However, on March 13, the EU Commission unexpectedly awarded subsidies of 47 ECU per tonne, the equivalent of US$50, for more than onemillion tonnes of barley. "The timing and amount of these subsidies had a devastating impact on world barley prices.

(Compiled from Reuters and agencies)