Chickpeas are firmer across the board today. Indian futures were higher by around AUD$40 per tonne overnight and many traders and speculators are expecting futures to finish the week somewhere between AUD$100 and AUD$200 per tonne higher.
The trade in India is holding stock off the market in expectation of higher prices. This has the attention of the government which is now considering short term restrictions on imports in order to force stocks onto the market.
The sharp move is attributed to the poor weather conditions across the major chickpea growing areas in Australia. Much of the Darling Downs and NNSW saw morning temperatures drop to -2C to -4C yesterday morning. There were reports of chickpea plants on the Downs being frozen solid, not exactly conditions conducive to flowering and pod set.

The weekly USDA crop condition report appeared to lack any evidence that Hurricane Harvey had done much damage to the cotton belt. This has the trade mixed but generally expecting to see reductions in condition rating next week.
There is talk that many of the crops in the hardest hit part of Texas were already picked. Early estimates are only showing the loss of around 300,000 – 400,000 bales, not much compared to US production of 20.6 million bales. One point that is being considered important is the quality of the remaining crop that has been through some seriously wet weather.