STAT Communications Ag Market News

Canadian Chickpea Numbers Reinvented

PANAMA - Oct 9/20 - SNS -- Chickpea markets remained in a relatively narrow pricing band during the past week despite efforts by some exporters to use price to drive demand.

Markets were also helped by forceful assertions Canada has significantly fewer chickpeas than suggested by official Statistics Canada data and is unlikely to offer competition in 10mm and larger kabuli markets.

There is no hard data on domestic food consumption of chickpeas, but the fact imports approached 49,000 metric tons (MT) in 2017-18 and 53,000 in 2018-19 and almost 49,000 last season supports the contention Canada's domestic food consumption is pushing past 60,000 MT per year.

On the other hand, this also suggests Canadian production was bigger than thought in both 2016 and 2017. This does not change the fundamental situation in those marketing years, but makes more sense in terms of imports, nearly all of which would be destined for human consumption markets.

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