World Grain - June 2012 - 26

COUNTRYFOCUS

from Atkins (as the U.S.), although there is a hangover from Atkins. There is a doubt about the value of carbohydrates and there is a bit of a tendency, in our view incorrect, to effectively

meet their demands. But it does have a bit of an overall dampening effect on people’s attitude to products made with wheat.” Volatility has become an increasing

“Over a long time, U.K. millers have shifted to basing their businesses on the U.K. wheat supply. They used to import it.”
— Alex Waugh, director general, NABIM

equate white sugar and white ﬂour as much the same thing.” “There are people, of course, who are gluten intolerant and they need to be catered for,” he said. “But I think there are also quite a lot of people who are self diagnosing possibly incorrectly. In some ways you might say, there’s no problem with that, let’s just make gluten-free products to

feature of the market and millers have tried to tackle it. “There’s a whole range of things that people have tried to do to assist,” he said. “It is difﬁcult for millers’ customers if prices are bobbing around all the time. It’s not something that works very well in most business models.” “There have been some experiments with longer-term contracting,” he said.

“There is — one way or another — more widespread use of hedging strategies.” Millers are doing more to advise their customers on risk. “It’s now much more common than it would have been ﬁve years ago for salespeople to take their wheat buyers with them to talk to the customer,” he said. “It’s a collective decision rather than one business all the other taking all the risk.” “Over a long time, U.K. millers have shifted to basing their businesses on the U.K. wheat supply,” he said. “They used to import it. It is not over the last ﬁve years; it’s more a generational thing. It has made a difference.”
Chris Lyddon is World Grain’s European editor. He may be contacted at: chris.lyddon@ntlworld.com.
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World Grain - June 2012

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