The Briefing
- Argentina's corn exporters expect to load a record-breaking 10 million metric tons between August and September combined, versus a typical two-month volume of roughly 3 million tons.
- The 2025/26 harvest is the largest on record — 71.7 million tons by government estimates, or 70.5 million tons according to the Rosario grain exchange, a gap the two sources haven't reconciled.
- Russian strikes on Ukraine's Odesa port region and a drought-starved Danube River cut Ukrainian corn shipments 52% last month, pushing North African buyers toward Argentine supply instead.
A harvest big enough to reshape the map
Argentina, the world's third-largest corn exporter, is finishing off a 2025/26 season that no previous crop has matched. According to Reuters, government figures put the total harvest at 71.7 million tons, roughly 20% above the record set five seasons ago. The Rosario Board of Trade, Argentina's leading grain exchange, lands on a slightly more conservative 70.5 million tons.
Gustavo Idigoras, who leads the CIARA-CEC grains exporters' chamber, put the moment plainly: "Argentine corn right now is very competitive in price and in volume." He added that a typical August-September export window moves closer to 3 million tons — a fraction of what's shipping this year.
Why North African buyers turned to Argentina
Idigoras pointed to North Africa as the biggest force behind the surge, describing months of outreach to governments that had long leaned on Ukrainian grain. Numbers from INDEC, Argentina's statistics agency, back that up: corn shipments to North African markets climbed 45% between January and July, reaching 6.5 million tons — triple the country's 15% overall export growth rate over the same stretch.
Morocco led that charge, more than doubling its purchases with a 133% jump that brought its total to 1.55 million tons. Not far behind, Egypt bought 48% more corn, for a total of 2.4 million tons, while Algeria's imports rose a more modest 10%, also landing at 2.4 million tons.
Ukraine's ports, squeezed by war and drought
The pivot toward Argentina traces back to a conflict with no end in sight. Russian forces have stepped up attacks on port facilities around Odesa, the region that once moved nine out of every ten tons Ukraine exported by sea. With those Black Sea terminals largely out of commission, Kyiv has been forced to reroute cargo onto the Danube River, a far smaller and slower alternative.
Even that workaround is faltering. Record heat and drought across Europe have lowered water levels on the Danube, adding to congestion that was already building. The result: Ukrainian shipments sank 52% last month alone.
Javier Preciado Patiño, who analyzes grain markets and once ran trade policy for Argentina's government, said land routes are now essentially Ukraine's only option for moving grain, and predicted a good share of that corn will eventually reach France — another country where extreme heat has hurt corn yields, leaving its buyers looking elsewhere for supply.
Brazil's quiet retreat — and Argentina's opening
The other half of this story is playing out next door, in Brazil, which ships more corn abroad than any country besides the United States. Shipments out of Brazil have slid nearly 20% below the 53-million-ton peak reached three seasons ago, per U.S. Department of Agriculture figures, a pullback Idigoras says has directly benefited Argentine exporters.
The reason has less to do with weather than with what Brazil is doing with its own corn: increasingly, it's feeding a booming ethanol sector built on more than 300 plants that run on sugar or corn feedstock. Max Agro's Dante Romano, who heads research at the Rosario brokerage, called Brazilian domestic demand for corn remarkably strong and still climbing every year; the USDA puts the country's 2025/26 consumption at 98 million tons, up 7.1% from the prior season.
That shrinking export pool, according to Infocampo, could let Argentina reclaim the No. 2 spot in global corn exports for the first time in years — behind the United States, projected to ship 86.4 million tons, and ahead of Brazil, whose exportable surplus this season is estimated near 42 million tons. Four trading houses dominate Argentina's corn pipeline: Cargill, ADM, the newly merged Bunge-Viterra, and China's Cofco.
What the export boom means for Argentina's economy
The ripple effects are already showing up in the numbers. Corn sales by Argentine producers jumped to 7.65 million tons in August, up 47% from July, according to Infobae. Foreign-currency inflows from the broader agro-export sector reached $2.751 billion in August alone, pushing the year-to-date total through eight months to $19.048 billion — 12% above the 2008-2025 historical average for that stretch.
With September still unfolding, traders see the current numbers as a floor rather than a ceiling. As long as Ukraine's ports stay choked and Europe stays dry, each ship that leaves Rosario adds to Argentina's case as the unplanned beneficiary of a crisis it didn't create.
