Canada Markets

Statistics Canada's Milled wheat and wheat flour produced report for November shows 284,876 metric tons (mt) of all-wheat milled during the month. This is up from the 280,000 mt reported for October while below the 290,000 mt milled in September, the largest volume reported since July 2016.

The all-wheat volume milled during the first 11 months of the year is 3.031 million metric tons (mmt), similar to the 3.4 mmt forecast released by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) for the August-to-July 2022-23 crop year. During the first 11 months, this volume is 5.5% higher than the same period in 2021 and 3.8% higher than the five-year average. As seen on the attached chart, the monthly volume milled remains above the 10-year (2012-2022) trend, as indicated by the brown dotted line.

Data for durum shows a volume of 19,000 mt milled in November, the highest monthly volume in eight months. During the first 11 months of 2022, 199,000 mt of durum has been milled, up 4.7% from last year while 2.1% lower than the five-year average.

The monthly grind remains active despite Statistics Canada's price data released this week in their Consumer Price Index report for November. As seen in this month's report, prices for bread, rolls and buns continue to rise, up 18.2% from a year ago and a high for the year. The rate of inflation for the breakfast cereal and other cereal product category fell from the high reached in October, falling from a 17.8% year-over-year increase in October to 14.4% in November. The rate in inflation for the dry or fresh pasta category fell sharply in November, but remains at a price level that is 27.9% above one year ago. This is down from a 44.8% year-over-year price increase reported in October.

Prices for these categories have risen at a significantly faster pace than for food overall; food prices continued to rise overall in November, with Statistics Canada reporting that prices for food from stores rose by 11.4% year-over-year in November, up from 11% reported in October.

Cliff Jamieson can be reached at cliff.jamieson@dtn.com

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