“Tunisia will import 250,000 tons of wheat from France under the 2022-2023 campaign,” said Regional Manager for North-West and South Africa at ‘Intercéréales France’ Yann Lebeau.

Tunisia imports 15 to 25% of its soft wheat needs from France, he told TAP in the margins of the ‘2022 France-Tunisia grain meetings’ held Wednesday in Tunis.

For the 2021-2022 campaign, France has not exported wheat to Tunisia, because of the poor harvests we have recorded, he added.

«Tunisia imports from France 1.1 million tons of soft wheat, about 500,000 to 600,000 tons of durum wheat, 800,000 tons of barley and 1 million tons of corn.»

Head of international relations at ‘Intercéréales France’ Philippe Heusele said despite the significant water stress and extreme climatic phenomena recorded during the spring of the 2021-2022 crop year, France showed great resilience to these climatic conditions by a good quality production.

“The country produced 34.1 million tons (Mt) of soft wheat, 1.4 Mt of durum wheat and 11.4 Mt of barley during the same season,” the French official added.

«France, the world's fifth largest producer and fourth largest exporter of soft wheat, will be able to meet the demands of its customers and international partners. It plans to export nearly 10Mt of soft wheat outside the European Union during the 2022-2023 marketing year," according to data provided by ‘Intercéréales France.’

A technical cooperation agreement between Intercéréales France, the Tunisian grain office and FranceAgriMer was signed during the meeting.

The 3-year agreement provides for coordinating grain quality control and ensuring training on grain storage and conservation.

The France-Tunisia meetings are an opportunity to discuss several subjects related to the grain sectors in the two countries, such as climate change and marketing collected grain.