By Luzi Ann Javier Feb. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Wheat futures rose in Chicago after Australia, the world’s fourth-largest exporter, lowered its crop estimate. Soybeans and corn also rose. Wheat for March delivery jumped as much as 2.1 percent to $4.9675 a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade. It was at $4.9425 a bushel at 11:35 a.m. in London, trimming the grain’s decline this year to 8.7 percent. Milling wheat for March delivery rose 0.2 percent to 125.5 euros ($171.20) a metric ton on NYSE Liffe. Australia lowered its forecast for the 2009-2010 wheat crop by 1.5 percent to 21.66 million metric tons, from 21.99 million tons in December, after a heat wave last year was followed by heavy rain, the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics said today in an e-mailed report. Production in the previous season was 20.9 million tons, the bureau said. The bureau’s reduction “could be directly correlated” to the price gains, said Jonathan Barratt, managing director at Commodity Broking Services Pty in Sydney. Wheat for May delivery, the contract with the biggest open interest, rallied as much as 2 percent to $5.11 a bushel and last traded at $5.0875. March-delivery corn, which can be used in place of wheat in making animal feeds, added as much as 1 percent to $3.65 a bushel, and last traded at $3.6475 while soybeans for March delivery gained as much as 1.2 percent to $9.56 a bushel, before trading at $9.5525. Twenty-two of 35 traders and analysts surveyed on Feb. 12 from Tokyo to Chicago said corn will climb this week, and 22 of 36 respondents expected soybeans to rally. To contact the reporter on this story: Luzi Ann Javier in Singapore at ljavier@bloomberg.net

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