(Matt Brann’s post from the ABC NEWS Australia on 06 June 2026.)
Australia
forecast to produce a record 2.2 million tonnes of lentils: On below are three
glass jars. One filled with red lentils, one with yellow lentils and the third
with barley. Australian lentils are mostly exported to countries including
India and Bangladesh.
Australian
farmers are set to produce less wheat, barley and canola this year because of
dry seasonal conditions and high input costs. But they are on track to produce
Australia's biggest crop of lentils. National commodities forecaster ABARES
says lentil production is set to rise 3 per cent to a record 2.2 million
tonnes.
Following Graph is showing lentil production increases over the years. "Plantings have exploded across Victoria and South Australia, with production now creeping into places like WA and New South Wales," said Market Check chief executive Nick Crundall.
"Since
2020 there's been nearly a 150 per cent increase in acreage planted to lentils,
so there's a been a massive response from growers." He said there were a
few reasons growers had shifted to lentils, including the crop's ability to fix
nitrogen, which meant it didn't need as much fertiliser. "You don't need
to apply nearly as much, if any nitrogen, so you can get around some of the
input cost pressures by growing lentils compared to say canola."
Volumes up, but prices down
Lentil
prices went beyond $1,000 a tonne a couple of years ago, but with production
rising in Australia and Canada, prices are under pressure. "The lentil
price is about $660/tonne delivered into Melbourne/Geelong at the moment, so
gone are the days of $1,000 tonne lentils," Mr Crundall said.
"Prices
are still solid, but they're trending lower because of more acres [dedicated to
lentils] and also large stocks that are still sitting in Victoria from last
year's harvest." Mr Crundall said more than half of last year's lentil
harvest in Victoria was yet to be sold.
"Lentils
are sitting in sheds and silos, so growers have said no to these lower prices,
but that's now adding to the current outlook which is struggling to see a
rally," he said. "The obvious implication of this is that it's a
bearish outlook."
Betting on lentils
In
the South Australian government's latest Crop and Pasture Report, it estimated
lentil plantings would increase by 12 per cent in the state compared to last
season. "This firmly establishes lentils as the third largest crop area
[in South Australia] behind wheat and barley," it said.
Grower
Matt Cadd, who farms on SA's Yorke Peninsula, said he had increased his lentil
planting by 25 per cent. "Given the high fertiliser cost over the last
couple of years, canola has dropped out [of our program]," he told the SA
Country Hour. "So we're just doing wheat and lentils this year."
He
said despite lower lentil prices, it was still a good option for his farm this
year. "Lentils actually have nodules on their roots and take atmospheric
nitrogen and fixate it into the soil," he said. "So they don't
require any synthetic nitrogen [fertiliser] application and actually fix some
nitrogen into the soil for the next year's crop, like a wheat crop, to
use."
(Blogger's Notes: Human flows always follow the trades and goods flows. Australia now is selling a lot of lentils to India and bringing back hundreds of thousands of Indians. Like Chinese and Iron Ores. Australia sold a lot of iron ores to China last three decades and thus to let millions of Chinese come in.)
