Commodity prices rise for third straight month
The ANZ commodity price index rose 2% last month.
New Zealand commodity prices rose for a third straight month in July, led by dairy products, aluminium and meat, although the strong kiwi dollar limited the benefits for local producers.
The ANZ commodity price index rose 2% last month, bringing its three-month gain to 6.9%. In New Zealand dollar terms, prices have gained just 2.5% in the past three months and are 5.7% lower than in the same period last year.
The release of the commodity price index follows the results of the latest GlobalDairyTrade auction, which showed the GDT price index jumped 6.6% to $US2436 while the price of whole milk powder, the biggest product New Zealand sells by volume, rallied 9.9% to $US2265 a tonne. Dairy rose 4.1% month on month in the ANZ index, with casein up 7.8%, butter gaining 5.2% and milk powder up 4.1%.
Meat rose 2% in the latest month, led by a 4.4% increase in lamb prices and a 2.1% gain for beef. Aluminium rose 2.2%.
"World sheepmeat prices have primarily improved because of a significant drop-off in New Zealand supply," Con Williams, an agri-economist at ANZ New Zealand said. "This is due to a smaller lamb crop in 2015, some re-stocking and high early season turn-off." Beef prices were helped by lower seasonal supply within the US, he said.
Seafood prices were largely unchanged, forestry prices fell 1% and horticulture declined 1.4%.
(BusinessDesk)
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Jonathan Underhill
Wed, 03 Aug 2016
Wed, 03 Aug 2016
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Commodity prices rise for third straight month
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