Japan to lift imported wheat prices to millers from April

TOKYO, Feb 28 (Reuters) - Japan will raise the price of imported wheat to domestic millers from April by an average of 2.3 percent from the previous six-month period after higher import costs of Canadian wheat and a sales tax rise, a farm ministry official said on Friday.

Japan, the world's sixth-biggest wheat importer, buys the majority of its milling grain through import tenders for five types of feed quality wheat and sells to domestic millers at prices set twice a year.

The farm ministry's wheat selling price for the April-September period will average 58,590 yen ($570) per tonne, compared with 57,260 yen in the six months to March 31.

The price for Japanese millers like Nisshin Seifun Group

2002.T , Nippon Floor Mills 2001.T and Showa Sangyo , will also be 6.5 percent higher than an average price of 54,990 yen paid in the April-September period of 2013.

The cost increase will have minimal affect on consumer prices, a ministry estimate showed, since the raw material makes up only a minor share of the total cost of manufacturing products like flour, bread and noodles. ($1 = 102.0850 Japanese yen)

(Reporting by James Topham; Editing by Michael Perry)

((james.topham@thomsonreuters.com)(+813 6441 1858)(Reuters Messaging: james.topham.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))

Keywords: JAPAN WHEAT/PRICE