The Canadian canola crush slowed for the second straight month in February, falling to its second lowest of the 2023-24 marketing year.
A Statistics Canada crush report on Monday showed the February crush at 897,790 tonnes, down 4.1% from 936,593 in January and above only the 829,490 tonnes crushed in August 2023. However, last month’s crush was still up 10.5% from February 2023, while the cumulative August-February crush of 6.41 million tonnes was more than 700,000 or 12.4% ahead of the same period the previous year.
With five months remaining in the 2023-24 crop year, the crush at the end of February stood at 61% of Agriculture Canada’s full year forecast of 10.5 million tonnes.
Although it also declined in January – slipping 0.7% from December - the domestic crush remains a good news story for the canola market, especially as 2023-24 exports are running approximately one-third behind the year-ago pace.
In its March world supply-demand outlook, the USDA raised its estimate of Canada’s 2023-24 canola crush to 10.7 million tonnes, “driven by strong demand for canola oil.” Meanwhile, the USDA’s March Oil Crops Outlook reported that 2023-24 US canola oil imports through January were up 19% on the year, with larger shipments from Canada.
Rising renewable diesel production in both Canada and the US is increasing demand for canola oil. Canola crush capacity in Canada alone is set to grow from the current 11.2 million tonnes annually to just over 17 million over the next five years.
Ag Canada is still projecting the 2024-25 Canadian canola crush at an identical 10.5 million tonnes, but said it may have to be revised considerably higher, depending on how quickly the planned new Prairie crush plants are brought into operation.
According to StatsCan, the February crush produced 382,013 tonnes of canola oil, down from 398,507 in January but up from 336,866 in February 2023.
