Operation rates for soybean crush fall as expected this week (Jan 30-Feb 5) with the approaching of the Chinese Lunar New Year. Soybean crush at domestic mills totals 1987300 tonnes (meal 1569967 tonnes and oil 377587 tonnes), down 161500 tonnes or 7.5% from 2148800 tonnes last week. Meanwhile, operation rates (capacity utilization) are 56.04%, down 4.55% from 60.59% in the previous week. As operation rates will decline toward the end of the lunar year and soybean shortages, soybean crush is predicted to decline to 890,000 tonnes next week and further to 400,000 tonnes in week 7.

In the crop year of 2020/21 (from Oct 1st, 2020), China’s soybean crush totals 35,645,344 tonnes, up 6,930,344 tonnes or 24.13% from 28,715,000 tonnes a year earlier.

In the calendar year of 2021 (from Jan. 1st, 2021), China’s soybean crush amounts to 10,154,406 tonnes, up 3,473,049 tonnes or 51.98% from 6,681,357 tonnes of the corresponding period in 2020.

Fig.: Soybean Weekly Crush in China (2016-2021)

Details for weekly crush by region are shown as follows: