CHICAGO: Chicago Board of Trade corn futures ended firm on Friday after trading both sides of unchanged during the session. Concerns about hot and dry conditions stressing the crop in the western half of the US Midwest throughout its key pollination phase of development supported prices.

The benchmark CBOT December corn futures contract settled up 2-3/4 cents at $6.03-3/4 a bushel. For the week, corn futures fell 3.2%. Corn has fallen in three of the last four weeks.

wheat falls

Chicago Board of Trade soft red winter wheat futures fell 2.3% to their lowest since Feb. 11 on Friday, with improving prospects for a resumption in Black Sea exports from Ukraine weighing on prices for the second day in a row.

For the week, the most-active CBOT soft red winter wheat contract dropped 12.9%, its biggest weekly decline since March 2011.

K.C. hard red winter wheat and MGEX spring wheat futures also posted sharp losses, with K.C. wheat hitting its lowest since Feb. 17.

CBOT September soft red winter wheat futures settled down 18-1/4 cents at $7.76-3/4 a bushel, while K.C. September hard red winter wheat shed 9-1/2 cents to $8.39-1/4 and MGEX September spring wheat was 3-3/4 cents lower at $9.06-3/4. For the week, MGEX spring wheat lost 8.6% and K.C. hard red winter wheat lost 11.2%.

Ukraine is hurrying to clinch a deal with Russia, Turkey and the United Nations next week to export grain via its Black Sea ports, a senior Ukrainian official source said on Friday.

Import groups in the Philippines bought a total of 150,000 tonnes of wheat in two separate deals.