India: Cashew kernel exports fall

After a record rise in cashew kernel exports last year, exports of the commodity have seen a decline in the first two months of this financial year, owing to a shortage of raw cashew nuts. A decline in production in India and African countries led to the shortage.
For April and May this year, kernel exports stood at 15,715 tonnes, compared with 19,904 tonnes in the corresponding period last year, a decline of 21 per cent.
“The availability of raw cashew nuts was lower during the fourth quarter of last financial year; this was processed and exported in the months of April and May. Though the processors imported a higher quantity in the first two months, they faced a shortage in the preceding months. In addition, the prices of raw nuts rose significantly, adding to the cost of processors,” said Rahul Kamath, partner at Mangalore-based Bola Surendra Kamath and Sons.
He said new crop arrivals were seen only in April and due to a smaller crop this year, prices of raw cashew nuts increased about 50 per cent to Rs 100 a kg. Nuts imported from Tanzania were priced at Rs 94 a kg, which added to the processing sector’s costs. During April and May, many processing units either worked at half their capacities or were shut, Kamath said.
In value terms, exporters earned Rs 683.39 crore in April and May, 10.3 per cent lower than in the year-ago period, when their earnings stood at Rs 761.96 crore. In dollar terms, the earnings were $114.2 million, a decline of 18 per cent compared with the year-ago period’s $139.3 million. The average unit-value realisation was, however, higher at Rs 434.85 a kg, against Rs 382.82 a kg for April and May 2013.

“During the beginning of this financial year, raw cashew nuts weren’t freely available for exporters; the rupee was steady against the dollar. Some issues at the Tuticorin port resulted in a huge pile-up of trucks and led to delay in nuts exports. More, domestic prices were encouraging and the processors were happy to sell in domestic markets,” said Sasi Varma, executive director, Cashew Export Promotion Council of India.
In May, exports stood at 8,397 tonnes, against 7,318 tonnes in April. “At the beginning of the financial year, there was a slight drop in demand in consuming countries. But it is picking up now and we expect exports to pick up in the coming months. The buyers adopted a wait-and-watch policy in the first two months. Unavailability of raw cashew nuts was the main reason for decline in exports,” said Pankaj Sampath of Mumbai-based Samsons Traders said.
He said through the past six months, there was renewed demand for broken grades from buyers in the EU and the US. For 2013-14, India exported a record 113,260 tonnes, valued at Rs 4,976 crore, an all-time high.

- business-standard.com