New Zealand: Dairy industry can help smooth maize’s wild ride

Two years of maize season volatility has growers calling for earlier signalling by the dairy industry to help gauge supply and demand and stabilise pricing. Foundation for Arable Research general manager business operations Ivan Lawrie said knowing the area of maize silage required each season would assist maize growers to better plan their planting programmes. This follows an unprecedented roller-coaster ride for prices and demand in the past two years, with the market disruption caused by the war in Ukraine in early 2022 spiking prices of grains internationally. In New Zealand, the market highs quickly turned downwards as maize growers sought to catch the tail-end of soaring prices, just as the dairy market reduced demand for silage and international prices plummeted. Given maize not taken up by dairy farmers for silage is taken through by growers for grain, this led to an oversupply of maize grain in the North Island, which was exacerbated by a shortage of storage facilities. ...