EU maize imports soar 40% after drought ravages crops, soft wheat exports stable

Oct 20 (Reuters) - European Union maize imports in the 2026/27 season jumped 40% year on year by October 18, led by a more than threefold rise in shipments from the United States, while soft wheat exports were flat, European Commission data showed on Tuesday.

Analysts and industry lobbies had forecast that imports would surge this season as companies such as animal feed makers and starch companies seek to compensate for the drought-ravaged EU harvest set to be the lowest since at least 2000.

EU maize imports since the start of July had reached 6.64 million metric tons by Sunday, of which 2.9 million are from the US. By the same time the previous year, the EU had only imported about 900,000 tons of US maize (corn).

Ukraine also appeared to have benefited from the rise in EU maize import demand, with shipments from the country more than doubling year on year to 1.62 million tons from 770,000.

Brazil, by contrast, lost ground despite remaining the EU's second-largest maize supplier, with imports falling to 1.82 million tons from 2.74 million tons a year earlier.

In soft wheat, EU exports in the 2026/27 season were stable year on year by October 18 at 8.47 million tons.

Romania was the largest EU soft wheat exporter with 3.68 million tons, followed by Lithuania with 1.29 million tons, Poland with 0.97 million tons, Latvia with 0.89 million tons and Bulgaria with 0.73 million tons.

However, French export data has been incomplete since the start of 2024, data for Bulgaria and Ireland have been incomplete since the start of the 2023/24 marketing year, and data for Greece has been incomplete since January 2026.

EU barley exports had reached 2.22 million tons, up from 2.10 million tons the previous week but down 41% year on year.

The main destinations for EU soft wheat exports for 2026/27 so far were given as follows (in metric tons):

The main supplier countries for EU maize imports so far this season were as follows (in metric tons):