China, the world's top soya buyer, will continue to increase imports of the oilseed in 2011/2012 to meet rising demand from animal feed production, although releases by state reserves could weigh on the numbers, traders said. Fei Zhonghai, a trading executive with state-owned COFCO Co Ltd, estimated imports in 2011/12 would hit 58.5 million tonnes. That would be higher than the 52.3 million tonnes recorded in 2010/2011, a record.
"Next year will be a good year for livestock breeding; hog stocks have obviously increased, which will spur demand for protein meal," Fei told a panel discussion at an oilseed conference in Guangzhou over the weekend. Zhou Xuejun, a senior trader with Cargill Investments (China) Ltd also projected 2011/12 imports of 58 million tonnes, boosted by newly-increased capacity, according to a transcription posted on the Dalian Commodity Exchange (www.dce.com.cn).
Li Chaoyang, a soya trading manager with Noble (China), put the number as high as 61 million tonnes, adding the government may rebuild reserves to control food inflation as it did this year. Their estimates compared with the US Department of Agriculture's (USDA) 56.5 million tonnes. But they also said that the number could be lower due to possible releases of domestic soya reserves, with an estimated as much as 5 million tonnes stockpiled since 2008. Traders have been talking about possible sales since August.
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