The Russian Grain Union has urged the government to lift a temporary ban on flour exports imposed last week as part of a grain product export ban in response to the country's worst drought in decades, the union's spokesman Anton Shaparin said on Tuesday.
Shaparin claimed the ban would affect domestic flour producers who might lose their positions on external markets where they had gained a foothold in recent years. He also claimed flour exports do not threaten the country's grain reserves.
"Russia's flour producers have been gaining a foothold on external markets with great difficulty in the last four years. Agreement has been actually reached on supplies to the demanding but promising Indonesian market," he said.
"The flour market is a very specific market and flour is not an exchange-traded commodity. It is easy to lose a foothold on markets and difficult to win it back," he said.
The request to lift the ban had been initiated by flour producers from the Altai Territory, which accounted for 12 percent of Russia's flour output, Shaparin said.
Russia exports flour to Afghanistan, Israel, Moldova, Mongolia, South Korea, Tajikistan, Thailand, Turkmenistan, and other countries. Russia exported only 387,000 tons of flour in 2009.
MOSCOW, August 10 (RIA Novosti)
