Cack In The USSR?

Russian Deputy Agriculture Minister Sergey Korolev said Wednesday that Russian grain output this season will only total 85 MMT.

That is a sharp reduction of more than 21% on last year's 108.1 MMT.

Whilst it seems pretty clear that Russian output will not fare so well this year, it seems a little strange to me that all of a sudden these guys are coming out with huge reduction estimates on last season.

Am I just getting too cynical in my old age or what?

Only yesterday Alexei Gordeyev, the ex-head of the Russian Ministry of Agriculture, was forecasting a Russian grain crop of just 75-80 MMT. Yet a few weeks ago other private estimates were as high as 100 MMT.

It seem like now we have a margin of error of 25 MMT, how are we supposed to trade on that?