EAST COAST PORTS BUSY WITH EXPORTS FROM UK FARMERS

Even before last year was out the east coast ports of Grimsby and Immingham were busy with exports of UK wheat, barley and pulses from farmers across the country.

Contributing to this activity was Gleadell Agriculture, who has put five different commodities through the ports over the last two months.

Just before Christmas the company exported a massive 28,607 tonnes of wheat to Spain, made up of 5,000 tonnes of UKs branded wheat and 23,607 tonnes of feed wheat.

Following this, a further two shipments of feed wheat - amounting to over 20,000 tonnes - was exported by Gleadell to Ireland and Spain, and a cargo of over 3,000 tonnes of feed beans to Italy.

And in the last two days 4,000 tonnes of feed barley for Portuguese buyers has been loaded at Grimsby in record time; while at Immingham the Hansa Parijs - pictured - has taken on nearly 2,000 tonnes of OSR destined for Rotterdam today.

“This is an excellent start to 2006 for our farmer customers,” says David Sheppard, managing director of Gleadell Agriculture. “In what is continuing to be a difficult time for arable growers we are working hard to find good markets for UK products.”

Gleadell’s export programme remains busy with cargoes of feed beans and human consumption beans due to leave Immingham for Italy and Egypt respectively, in the next two weeks.