Egypt covers its wheat requirements through June 2025, according to an exclusive

According to two people with firsthand information, Mostakbal Misr for Sustainable Development, Egypt’s official grain buyer, has secured enough wheat to cover the nation’s requirements through the end of June 2025.

However, other traders questioned the scale of the agreements due to a lack of information regarding the timing, pricing, and if the contracts constitute completely new arrangements.

The sources told Reuters that Mostakbal Misr’s contracts totaled around 1.267 million metric tons, the most of which came from Russia. They asked not to be named because they were not authorized to talk publicly.

They stated that more supplies of the contractual wheat are planned in the upcoming months, with shipments already starting to arrive at Egyptian ports.

A major shift occurred in December when Mostakbal Misr was chosen to be Egypt’s exclusive importer of strategic goods.

Prior to its establishment by presidential order in 2022, Mostakbal Misr served as the Egyptian Air Force’s development branch, and the General Authority for Supply Commodities (GASC), which has been in place for decades, was the nation’s strategic grain buyer.

Usually, the GASC imports four to five million tons annually.

Traders and observers pointed to a lack of transparency on the terms of procurement and discrepancies between the evidence now available on the market and the statistics on Mostakbal Misr’s contracted quantities, as reported by the sources.

“We are unable to verify the reported transaction. Since they did not take part in it, accredited Russian exporters are unaware of its specifics,” Eduard Zernin, head of Rusgrain, told Reuters.

Some quantities were bought, according to a European dealer, but “nowhere near” the amount the sources stated.

According to another merchant, the quantity was around 480,000 metric tons, mostly purchased in Egyptian pounds from nearby port warehouses.

Reuters was unable to confirm the facts on its own.

Seventy million Egyptians rely on wheat imports for their subsidized bread, and the country has faced difficulties importing the grain in recent months as its strategic supplies have diminished.

International organizations that provide Egypt with hard money have opposed the proposed agency, an Egyptian government official told Reuters.

The official stated that they would only deal with “civilian bodies” rather than government agencies, and that the strategic reserves, including already contracted amounts, had decreased from a seven-month supply in July 2024 to just three months of reserve at this time.

For delivery in October, the GASC purchased 430,000 tons of Russian wheat in September. Only two cargoes totaling 120,000 tons have been delivered thus far, since delays forced supplies into November and December.

Additionally, Egypt purchased 290,000 tons of wheat in November, bringing the total amount shipped since September to 410,000 tons.

This amount is only a minor portion of Egypt’s larger wheat procurement strategy, which was previously revealed by Supply Minister Sherif Farouk with the goal of securing 3.8 million tons by the end of 2024.