Lentil shipments to Turkey expected to shrink

Turkey’s big lentil crop and growing financial woes are going to hurt shipments to Canada’s top market, says a Turkish processor of the crop.

Growers in that country planted more acres than last year, and yields appear to be about 25 percent higher, said Tuba Memis, general manager of Memisoglu Tarim-TAT, one of the largest food companies in Turkey.

There are also ample stocks of imported product. Memis said an exemption on the 20 percent lentil import duty expires on June 30.

“All lentil importers in Turkey bought their needs a few months in advance and stocked up,” she said in an email.