Little movement in organic grain prices

By Glen Hallick
Glacier FarmMedia staff

Although the bulk of the 2023/24 organic grain harvest in Canada has been put into the bin, prices have not changed a great deal. Be it in Southern Ontario or the Prairie Provinces, prices have largely remained steady as demand continued to be rather flat.

“We’re not seeing a whole lot of movement,” stated Rob Wallbridge, a director-at-large with the Organic Council of Ontario. “Buyers just seem to be reluctant to commit to very large volumes, very far out.”

He pointed to ongoing concerns of a recession as a major reason.

“In the overall economy there’s some concern about the impact of inflation and rising grocery costs are going to have on the organic market as a whole,” Wallbridge explained, noting it’s the same with the markets for conventional grains.

“We are seeing conventional grain prices are down a lot as well, so that puts downward pressure on organic prices,” he added.

• RELATED: Organic price quotes for late October

To Harro Wehrmann of Wehrmann Grain and Seed in Ripley, Ont. organic grains prices in October were essentially the same as those in the previous month.

He estimated Ontario’s organic soybean harvest was around 70 per cent complete, and already “everyone is full of soybeans with no new contracts being offered.” Of those still in the fields, Wehrmann said they would most likely end up being sold for feed.

Harvest issues hampered the soybeans, he added, noting that frequent rains during the second half of September delayed combining. Also, sunflower seed combining was about halfway finished while the corn harvest was just getting underway.

“Every other day it rained,” Wehrmann said, adding Southern Ontario farmers were finding it to be a challenge to plant their winter crops.

“It’s been symptomatic of climate change. [We had] a wet, cold winter, then we had a dry month in May, so seeding was a challenge. June was still dry while July and August as well as the first part of September were not very wet,” he explained.

“Late September turned cool-ish and wet. Harvest was a challenge. Generally, the quality is good, but everything had to be harvested wet,” he continued.

“At least we didn’t have grasshoppers,” Wehrmann quipped.

On the Canadian Prairies, snow has either delayed what was left of the region’s harvest or brought it to a complete halt.

“Harvest went pretty well from what we heard,” said Scott Shiels of Grain Millers Canada in Yorkton, Sask. “There still is a little bit of a crop that means to come off yet, and that’s unfortunate with the weather changing now on us.”

Yields were alright, kind of in that average-ish range. – Scott Shiels.

From what has arrived at Grain Millers, Shiels commented, “the oat quality has been really good, and the flax quality was pretty OK.”

“Yields were alright, kind of in that average-ish range,” he added.

Shiels also commented organic prices for oats and flax ran contrary to the overall trend by bumping up a little. But to Jason Breault, prices for organic wheat have pulled back.

“I think it’s a North American issue. There’s a lot of grain out there and demand is a little less,” he said, noting that the declines in conventional grain prices have pulled down those for organics.

“We sell stuff to other places to and they’re starting to come looking, but they’re offering a lower bid,” Breault added.

However, he cautioned supplies are not overly large.

“There’s enough grain, but I’m not going to say an abundance of grain.”

To Cal Vandaele of Vandaele Seeds Ltd. in Medora, Man. the amount of grain coming off of Prairie fields depended on, “where the thunderstorms went.”

While the eastern half of the region fared the dry spells, the western portion didn’t as well especially its southern areas.

As for the demand for organic grain he believed to be steady. Premiums for high quality flax were two to three times the price of conventional flax. Premiums for rye, which he deals with primarily, were consistent.