Feed barley appeared destined for China's livestock sector, he said.

However, information was cloaked on how much of China's crops had been destroyed by floods, he said. This reflected a desire by Chinese buyers to dampen potential price rises.

The Australian Barley Board (ABB) and other Australian marketers had participated in recent sales to China, the source said. He declined to be specific on tonnage.

"Inquiry from China has picked up quite substantially," he said, adding that this was in the normal pattern after China's summer break.

Australian barley sales to China this year, at lesser tonnages than usual, were showing a changing pattern from big forward contracts to more hand to mouthpurchases, Australian barley industry sources said.

"(But) it's fair to say things are stabilising," one said of the depressed barley market.

As reported by Reuters on September 4, other Australian barley industry sources, also requesting that they not be named, report renewed interest in barley purchasers by China.

"There might be some reasonable business done there," one source then said, noting that ABB and other Australian marketers had flocked to China in recent weeks.

Australian feed barley sales to China, unusual in a market which normally imports Australian malting barley for beer production, were believed to be for fishfeed in fish farming, that source said.