China's state grain stockpiler sees record inventory cut

BEIJING - China's state grain stockpiler Sinograin said Saturday that it had made breakthrough in inventory reduction last year, with record high sales of 132.73 million metric tons.

Sinograin has met its goal in reducing the inventory of cotton, soybeans and rapeseed oil in 2018, second year of its inventory-cutting drive, according to the company's general manager Deng Yiwu.

The company managed to reduce reserves in over 7,000 storehouses by 100 million metric tons of corn, 17 million metric tons of unhusked rice, 10.66 million metric tons of wheat, over 2 million metric tons of soybeans, 420,000 metric tons of rapeseed oil and 2.5 million metric tons of cotton, Deng said.

Despite solid progress, the volume of the state grain inventory is still high, Deng said, noting that the company would continue to enhance risk control of reserves to safeguard food security.

Reducing excess food stockpiles has been part of China's effort in cutting inefficient supply, which has also seen capacity cuts in the steel and coal sector, according to the government work report of 2018.