CAIRO: Egypt’s state grains buyer, the General Authority for Supply Commodities, announced on Tuesday a massive tender for 3.8 million metric tons of wheat to cover imports between October 2024 and April 2025, its largest ever according to traders.
Egypt has been one of the world’s largest wheat importers, mainly to provide subsidised bread for tens of millions of its people. GASC alone imports some 5.5 million metric tons of wheat annually for bread subsidies.
GASC is seeking the wheat for shipment periods spanning 1-15 and/or 16-30 of each month starting in October until April, with the shipment date in February to be 16-28. Egypt is seeking the cargoes on a free-on-board basis and will purchase using 270-day letters of credit.
GASC is requesting that traders submit bids for at least three months’ shipments. The deadline for offers is Aug 12.
“This is a very strange tender,” said one trader.
“We usually submit bids for shipping a month or two in advance. It would be very difficult to submit a freight offer six or seven months in advance,” he added.
Traders told Reuters that the latest tender is an enormous change to GASC’s whole purchasing strategy and could be a win-all or lose-all situation for the North African country, which is working to keep its economy afloat with the support of the International Monetary Fund and friendly Gulf countries who have injected billions of dollars in loans and investments in 2024 alone.
Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday, Egypt’s Finance Minister Ahmed Kouchouk said that not all repercussions of the global sell-off wave are negative, as commodity prices are now at an almost four-year low.
Shortly after GASC’s announcement, European wheat futures rose on Tuesday.
“My colleagues (at the government) are seizing this opportunity to buy what we need amid the current situation in the global market,” Kouchouk said.
However, traders are skeptical about Egypt’s ability to fulfill its ambition.
“I doubt if they will be able to get the full volume,” said another trader. He said the 270-day payment is very off-putting.
However, a third trader said trading houses will want the business and will just add the banking costs of the 270-day payment delay to their price offers.
GASC said it aims to maintain a wheat reserve sufficient to meet nine months of demand.
As of July, wheat Egypt’s strategic reserves of wheat were estimated to be sufficient for 6.9 months. “It appears that Egypt wants to get big supplies in storage or at least in its books. This could be due both to Egypt’s financial problems or the threat of greater war in the Middle East,” a European trader told Reuters.
“They could shoot themselves in the foot by buying in advance but then having to regret if prices fall later.”

WASHINGTON: About a dozen F/A-18 fighter jets from the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier have flown to a military base in the Middle East, as part of the Pentagon’s effort to help defend Israel from possible attacks by Iran and its proxies and to safeguard US troops, according to a US official.
The F/A-18s and a E-2D Hawkeye surveillance aircraft took off from the carrier in the Gulf of Oman and arrived at the undisclosed base on Monday, said the official.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin ordered the increased military presence in the region as officials worry about escalating violence in the Middle East in the wake of the killings last week of a senior Hezbollah commander in Lebanon and Hamas’ top political leader in Iran, in suspected Israeli strikes. Both groups are backed by Iran.
The Navy jets’ land-based deployment is expected to be temporary, because a squadron of Air Force F-22 fighter jets is enroute to the same base from their home station in Alaska. The roughly dozen F-22s are expected to arrive in the Middle East in the coming days, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss troop movements.
It’s not clear how long all of the aircraft will remain together at the base, and that may depend on what — if anything — happens in the next few days.
The troop movements come as US officials released more details about the rocket attack that hit a military base in Iraq on Tuesday, injuring American personnel. Officials said five US service members and two contractors were hurt when two rockets hit the base.
The officials said five of those injured were being treated at the Al-Asad air base and two were evacuated, but all seven are in stable condition. They did not provide details on who was evacuated.
The rocket attack is the latest in what has been an uptick in strikes on US forces by Iranian-backed militias. It comes as tensions across the Middle East are spiking but is not believed to be connected to the Hezbollah and Hamas killings.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss military operations.
In recent weeks, Iranian-backed Iraqi militias have resumed launching attacks on bases housing US forces in Iraq and Syria after a lull of several months, following a strike on a base in Jordan in late January that killed three American soldiers and prompted a series of retaliatory US strikes.
Between October and January, an umbrella group calling itself the Islamic Resistance in Iraq had regularly claimed attacks that it said were in retaliation for Washington’s support of Israel in its war against Hamas in Gaza and were aimed at pushing US troops out of the region.