WASHINGTON, DC, US — The US Department of Agriculture’s 24-hour export reporting service on Jan. 26 said US private exporters sold 1.36 million tonnes of corn to China over the weekend. The terms of the huge transaction called for shipment during the 2020-21 marketing year.

According to the USDA’s most recent weekly Export Sales report, accumulated exports and undelivered sales of US corn to China through Jan. 14 for delivery in the 2020-21 marketing year totaled 11,768,700 tonnes. That total compared with 60,000 tonnes as the aggregate for delivery in 2019-20 recorded a year earlier.

The USDA in its January World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report issued Jan. 12 forecast China to import 17.5 million tonnes of corn from all origins in 2020-21, up 9.9 million tonnes, or 130%, from 7.6 million tonnes in 2019-20 and compared with 4.48 million tonnes in 2018-19.

The USDA’s Economic Research Service in in January Feed Outlook report, said, “As corn domestic prices in China continue to be strong, and the spread between domestic and world prices grows, the country maintains a fast pace of imports into its Southern feed-deficit provinces and also the North China Plain.”

The ERS continued, “Since the beginning of calendar year 2020, China has already imported around 10 million tonnes of corn, far more than its current tariff rate quota of 7.2 million tonnes allows. China is doing this despite making no formal announcement by its National Development and Reform Commission that additional quotas have been allocated, despite a recent World Trade Organization case indicating the need for more tariff rate quota transparency. China is obtaining corn mainly from the United States and Ukraine, with much smaller amounts coming from Bulgaria (part of the European Union) and Russia.”