Milling wheat premiums have soared over the past week, driven by strong export demand to Germany and the weakness of sterling.

Torrential rain in Germany has damaged milling wheat quality there, and early harvested supplies are now blocked in by wet, lower-Hagberg samples.

The pound fell by 1.3% against the Euro in the week to Wednesday, to 83.19p, making exports even more competitive. And with German milling premiums rising sharply, British premiums have jumped to £30/t over feed, pegging Group 1 varieties at £174/t for spot movement.

However, export demand was primarily for lower-protein samples of 10.5-12%, so farmers should get all varieties tested and stored separately.

“We are shipping this type of milling wheat in some volume because of the uncertainty over the EU crop,” said one trader.

Feed wheat values have also improved, by about £7/t over the past week, aided by continued difficulties in Russia and the Black Sea region.

The latest report by the International Grains Council cut Russian production by 6m tonnes and lowered world wheat production by 7m tonnes, to 644m tonnes, which is a drop of 33m tonnes on last year. It increased demand by 2m tonnes to 657m tonnes, and cut ending stocks by 8m tonnes, to 184m tonnes – 17% lower than 2009/10.