Following a pickup in operation rates this week (Aug 15-21), soybean crush at domestic mills totals 2,017,000 tonnes (meal 1,593,430 tonnes and oil 383,230 tonnes), up 51,200 tonnes or 2.6% from 1,965,800 tonnes last week. Meanwhile, operation rates (capacity utilization) are 58.09%, up 1.47% from 56.62% in the previous week. Soybean crush is predicted to increase to around 2.02 mln tonnes and 2.05 mln tonnes in the coming two weeks, respectively. The crush is likely to go lower than the forecast as some mills may suspend or cut production under swelling meal inventories.

Soybean crush nationwide is estimated at 8.99 mln tonnes in August at current utilization rate, above 8.9415 mln tonnes in the previous month and also far above 7.5715 mln tonnes of the corresponding period last year.

As of this week, soybean crush nationwide totals 79,880,064 tonnes in the soybean crop year of 2019/20 (from Oct 1st, 2019), up 4,339,679 tonnes or 5.74% from 75,540,385 tonnes of the same period last year. In calendar year of 2020 (from Jan. 1st, 2020), national soybean crush amounts to 57,850,550 tonnes, up 5,461,565 tonnes or 10.43% from 52,388,985 tonnes of the corresponding period in 2019.

Fig.: Soybean Weekly Crush in China (2016-2020)

Details for weekly crush by region and by group are shown as follows: