The new year began with the new variant of the Covid Virus for many of us around the world but luckily, we are seeing speedy recoveries and far fewer fatalities considering that a large part of the global population is vaccinated.
The virus seems to have taken a toll on Sesame markets as well since global trade for this item seems to have slowed down in the last quarter of 2021. From the Indian perspective we had markets shoot up substantially in October just as the new crop started as the crop numbers were quite small. However, with lack of demand in International markets and surprisingly in domestic markets as well, the price levels could not sustain and we saw a gradual decline of upto USD. 200 – 300 per ton in all grades of sesame. We also had a continuous supply of the 2021 summer crop which augmented local supply.
With a lot of the old stock used up and low arrivals, we finally saw a bounce back of sorts from the lower levels are markets are fairly stable for the last 2 weeks now. We still have 4 clear months to go before the summer crop and even with a smaller demand, the stocks are not likely to be keep up with demand. Hence it is our personal opinion that markets may slowly edge up in India over the next few months. Imports of sesame have been quite negligible as there was no parity looking at Indian levels.
Planting for summer crop sesame in Gujarat would commence by the end of February and it remains to be seen if we will have similar crop numbers like last year or not. There is one school of thought that feels farmers may plant lesser sesame this year as compared to previous years.
Container availability is surely better than what we were experiencing last year but nowhere close to normal. Freight rates to most destinations West of India are in excess of USD. 150 per ton and easily go up to USD. 300 – 350 per ton. This continues to give a boost to our competing origins mainly for the hulled sesame seed business.
Current values on FOB basis for February 2022 shipping in 25 kgs pp bags –
Natural 99/1/1 – USD. 1535.00 pmt
Natural 99/1 – 99.90 % – USD. 1560.00 pmt
Natural 99/1 – Sortex – USD. 1630.00 pmt
Natural Black, Sortex – USD. 1800.00 pmt
Natural Jet Black, Sortex – USD. 2050.00 pmt
Hulled Sesame, 99.90 % – USD. 1800.00 pmt
Hulled Sesame, 99.95 % – USD. 1915.00 pmt
Hulled Sesame, 99.98 % – USD. 1950.00 pmt
Please revert your interest.