Some Russia farmers switching to corn, oilseeds

Farmers in Russia's Black Earth region are planning to plant more corn and oilseeds in the 2013–2014 season in the hopes of higher profits, according to reports.
Corn typically gives bigger yields in the area’s soils than in the south, and has a ready market in the livestock farms in the vicinity, said Oleg Sukhanov, an analyst at the Moscow-based Institute for Agricultural Market Studies. Corn yields in the Belgorod region were 6.2 metric tons per hectare this season, compared with about 5 metric tons per hectare in the southern Stavropol region, according to the regions’ agricultural ministries.
Russia’s corn crop was 8 million metric tons in 2012, beating the previous record of 7 million metric tons in 2011, according to state statistics data. Russia may be the seventh-largest corn exporter in the 2012–2013 season, after the U.S., Argentina, Brazil, Ukraine, India and South Africa, shipping 2.3 million metric tons, 13 percent more than in the 2011–2012 season, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates.

Cherkizovo posts 114 percent first-quarter net income growth

Russian meat producer Cherkizovo Group has posted a net income of US$39.3 million in the first quarter of 2012, a 114 percent increase from 2011's US$18.4 million, according to the company's latest financial report.
Sales volumes in the company's poultry division for the first quarter of 2012 increased by 42 percent to approximately 75,860 metric tons of sellable weight compared to approximately 53,570 metric tons for the first quarter of 2011, reflecting the contribution from the newly launched sites at Bryansk and sales by Mosselprom, acquired in May 2011. Prices for poultry decreased by 1 percent, from $2.43 per kilogram in the first quarter of 2011 to $2.40 per kilogram in the first quarter of 2012. Compared to the price in the fourth quarter of 2011 of $2.36, prices in the first quarter of 2012 were nearly flat.
"In the second half of the year, we still expect many uncertainties related to Russia’s admission to the [World Trade Organization]," said the company. "Cherkizovo will continue to focus on both parts of its strategy, strong organic growth along with investing into production, asset development and considering possible acquisitions."