Biodiesel prices rise sharply

In Germany, UFOP reports that for several years now, bumper crops have led to global oversupply and, as a consequence, a build-up of stocks at high levels. At the same time, the shares of biofuels in the top agricultural commodity exporting countries in Asia and North and South America reached new record highs. Governments have responded to the surpluses by raising the national biofuels mandates to stabilise producer prices. The current biodiesel hype, which has little impact on selling prices of raw rapeseed oil, shows that fuel prices have little influence on agricultural commodity prices. Demand for rapeseed methyl ester over the past few weeks caused a decline in supply, but feedstock remained abundant at all times. Consequently, rapeseed oil prices only rose slightly. At the same time, the price gap between rapeseed oil and palm oil widened to approximately EUR 300 per tonne, according to information published by Agrarmarkt Informations-Gesellschaft mbH (AMI). The key issue affecting the product chain of rapeseed processing and biodiesel production in Germany is the uncertain transport situation due to low water levels in Germany’s rivers that have curtailed the flow of goods and led to rising prices.