Last year China and the South each sent about 500,000 tons of grain.

It's not generally known, but they've got at least 60,000 tons of grain away like that,' he said.

Russia had hoped to harvest 70 million tons of grain this year.

The total storage capacities at once are 130 000 tons of grain.

It imported about 3.8 million tons of grain in 1998.

The wheat harvest in 2008 was expected to be 2,500 tons of grain.

Last year, China consumed 40 million more tons of grain than it produced.

The result: an extra 500,000 tons of grain a year - enough to feed at least 2.5 million people.

The country imported 36 million tons of grain last year, but has recently had trouble meeting its foreign payments.

Collective farms were still expected to return 132,750 tons of grain, which had been provided in spring 1932 as aid.