As the country prepares to flip pancakes for the day AgriLand takes a look at the main ingredient in the food for ‘Pancake Tuesday’ – flour. Do you know where the flour for the batter is coming from?

Figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) show that 214,021t of flour (of wheat or meslin) were imported into the Republic of Ireland in 2018. This flour was valued at €80,191,000 or €374.69/t.

This is an increase of 4,220t on the 2017 figure of 209,801t. In 2017, the value of the product imported (landed cost) was €77,190,000 or €367.92/t.

Imports came from 25 different regions in 2018 including:
  • Belgium;
  • Bulgaria;
  • Canada;
  • Ceuta;
  • China;
  • Denmark;
  • France;
  • Gabon;
  • Germany;
  • Great Britain;
  • Greece;
  • Grenada;
  • India;
  • Italy;
  • Latvia;
  • Lithuania;
  • Luxembourg;
  • Netherlands;
  • Nigeria;
  • Northern Ireland;
  • Peru;
  • Poland;
  • Romania;
  • Slovenia;
  • United Arab Emirates.

Looking at the list it appears, as has been the case with other imports detailed in the last few days on AgriLand, that in some cases the product traveled through the country it came from, but this was not necessarily the country of origin of the product.

The majority of this flour came from Great Britain. 148,835t of this flour (of wheat and meslin) came from across the water – 69.5% of all flour imports.

Northern Ireland accounted for 52,124t of these imports – 28% of the total.

Durum wheat was also imported – 11,421t in 2018 and 9,252t in 2017.

Wheat for animal feed

Wheat for animal feed falls into the “other wheat” category. 427,751t of “other wheat” were imported into this country in 2018. This was an increase of 40% on 2017 when 304,788t were imported.

AgriLand must stress that this raw data was provided by the CSO and indicates trends, some figures may be subject to change.