Egypt’s official grain purchaser began offering yellow corn on the country’s newly established commodities exchange on Thursday, according to exchange chief Ibrahim Ashmawy in a statement issued on Saturday.
Egypt’s state buyer, the General Authority for Supply Commodities (GASC), began offering rare corn bids early this year in an effort to alleviate a feed crisis that had hampered small farmers and even prompted some farmers to slaughter chicks.
Supply Minister Ali Moselhy had said the corn would be offered to local producers on the exchange.
Egypt, a major buyer of basic commodities, has been suffering from a foreign currency crunch that sent the pound tumbling by nearly 50% against the dollar, suppressed imports, and pushed official headline inflation to 31.9% in February, its highest for five and a half years.
Egypt’s annual urban consumer inflation rate in March climbed to 32.7% year-on-year, just shy of an all-time record.
GASC additionally provided wheat to suffering mills via the stock market, selling roughly 570,000 tonnes since the stock market’s inception in November, according to the statement.
