Louis Dreyfus Company, one of the world’s largest farm commodity traders, said on Friday one of its soybean crushing plants in China halted operations this week, amid widespread curbs on power consumption that have hit manufacturers in a number of sectors across the country.
The LDC facility in the northern city of Tianjin has a daily crushing capacity of 4,000 tonnes. It has been closed since Sept. 22, the company told Reuters.
At least two other plants in the city also closed this week, while crushers in the eastern province of Jiangsu have also been impacted, said a soymeal purchaser with a major animal feed company in northern China.
China’s provincial authorities have stepped up enforcement of emissions curbs in recent weeks, leading to strict limits on power loads that have hampered production across a swathe of industrial consumers.
The closure of crushing facilities has pushed up cash soymeal prices
“Cash is on fire,” said the soymeal buyer.
“Those shutdowns impact our plans, this is normally the time when feedmills need to build stocks ahead of the holidays,” he added.
LDC declined to comment further on the impact. It is not known how long the curbs on power consumption will continue. ($1 = 6.4637 Chinese yuan renminbi) (Reporting by Dominique Patton; editing by Jason Neely and David Evans)
