The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said today that its price index, which tracks the most globally traded food commodities, averaged 135.9 points last month versus a revised 136.0 for September.

The September figure was previously put at 136.3.

The index has fallen from a record of 159.7 in March, but remained 2% higher than a year earlier.

While prices dipped overall, the cereal index rose 3%, with wheat up 3.2%, mostly reflecting uncertainties related to exports from Ukraine and also a downward revision for US supplies.

International rice prices increased 1%.

By contrast, FAO’s vegetable oil index fell 1.6% in October and was down nearly 20% on its year-earlier level.

Rising international quotations for sunflower seed oil were more than offset by lower world prices of palm, soy and rapeseed oils.

Dairy prices fell 1.7%, meat was down 1.4% and sugar eased 0.6%.

In separate cereal supply and demand estimates, FAO lowered its forecast for global cereal production in 2022 to 2.764 billion tonnes from a previous 2.768 billion tonnes.

That is 1.8% below the estimated output for 2021.

“The month-on-month downward revision almost entirely concerns the wheat crop in the US, reflecting downgrades to yields and harvested area,” FAO said.

World cereal use in 2022/23 is expected to surpass production at 2.778 billion tonnes, leading to a projected 2% fall in global stocks compared with 2021/22 to 841 million tonnes.

That would represent a stocks-to-use ratio of 29.4%, down from 30.9% in 2021/22 but still relatively high historically, FAO said.

World trade in cereals in 2022/23 was predicted to register a 2.2% contraction to 469 million tonnes.