Domestic operation rates in oil mills rally from a low ebb with the completion of holidays this week (Feb 20-26), but the rally is smaller than the forecast for a lack of beans in some mills. Soybean crush at domestic mills totals 1,519,200 tonnes (meal 1,200,168 tonnes and oil 288,648 tonnes), up 1,190,200 tonnes or 361.76% from 329,000 tonnes last week. Meanwhile, operation rates (capacity utilization) are 42.84%, up 33.56% from 9.28% in the previous week. With the end of the vacation and imported soybeans put into mills, operation rates will continue rising next week and soybean crush is forecast to be 1.80 mln tonnes, bu as soybean arrivals reduce in March, some oil mills will suspend production and the crush may fractionally decline to 1.78 mln tonnes.

Soybean crush nationwide is estimated at 4.68 mln tonnes in February at current utilization rate, against the 8.8145 mln tonnes in the previous month and 6.3247 mln tonnes a year earlier.

In the crop year of 2020/21 (from Oct 1st, 2020), China’s soybean crush totals 38,407,144 tonnes, up 4,380,544 tonnes or 12.87% from 34,026,600 tonnes a year earlier.

In the calendar year of 2021 (from Jan. 1st, 2021), China’s soybean crush amounts to 12,916,206 tonnes, up 923,249 tonnes or 7.70% from 11,992,957 tonnes of the corresponding period in 2020.

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

Details for weekly crush by region are shown as follows: