BEIJING (Reuters) - A vessel carrying 70,223 tonnes of sorghum from the United States bound for Asia switched its destination on Thursday, data showed, becoming the latest cargo to be diverted in a trade flow roiled by China's move last week to impose hefty deposits on U.S. imports of the grain.
The 'RB Eden' was heading to the Canary Islands' Las Palmas, in the Atlantic Ocean, according to Thomson Reuters Eikon ship tracking data on Thursday. It is due to arrive there on May 12.
The ship loaded U.S. sorghum from trader ADM's Corpus Christi grain elevator in Texas on March 18, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data. It wasn't immediately clear where the cargo was originally contracted for in Asia.
When the Chinese government hit U.S. sorghum imports with a big antidumping deposit on April 18, it was headed east-northeast through the Indian Ocean off the coast of South Africa.
After news of the Beijing move broke, the vessel turned around and remained in the area, before heading back west.
Later on Thursday, the 'Ocean Pride', carrying 58,593 tonnes of sorghum loaded at ADM's Galveston, Texas, grain elevator in early March, entered Kashima port in Japan, Reuters shipping data showed.
It had switched its destination from Shanghai on Tuesday, one of four China-bound vessels that were diverted earlier this week. Three are heading to Saudi Arabia.
(For a graphic of the route of RB Eden click https://reut.rs/2KffT1L)