HAMBURG - Chicago wheat, corn and soybeans fell on Monday as fears of a global economic downturn and expectations of a bumper wheat crop in Russia weighed.

Corn and soybeans were weakened also by forecasts of welcome dry weather during the U.S. harvest.

“Fears of recession risk with reduced global demand is weakening wheat, corn and soybeans today,” said Matt Ammermann, StoneX commodity risk manager. “The U.S. Federal Reserve and other central banks are taking a firm stand on inflation by raising rates, regardless of arguments about whether this is appropriate.”

Chicago Board of Trade most active wheat fell 1.5% to $8.67-1/4 a bushel at 1104 GMT, after dropping over 3% on Friday.

Corn fell 0.5% to $6.73-1/4 a bushel, soybeans fell 0.3% to $14.21-1/2 a bushel.

Russia’s Sovecon consultancy on Thursday raised its forecast for Russia's 2022 wheat crop to the psychologically-important level of 100 million tonnes.

“The stronger dollar will be a burden to U.S. exports, especially at a time when a huge Russian wheat harvest is expected,” Ammermann said. “Corn and soybeans are also seeing weakness from forecasts of dry U.S. weather this week which will be positive for U.S. harvest work."

But there is also attention on the stock reports from the USDA on Friday, with background expectations that U.S. soybean inventories may be smaller than anticipated, he added.

Lower prices were sparking some import demand. Major South Korean animal feed maker Nonghyup Feed Inc (NOFI) bought an estimated 135,000 tonnes of corn on Monday.

Dealers continue to monitor developments in the Russia-Ukraine war after increased tension last week.

Some 211 ships with 4.7 million tonnes of agricultural products have left Ukraine so far under the deal to unblock Ukrainian sea ports, the Ukrainian infrastructure ministry said on Saturday.

(Reporting by Michael Hogan in Hamburg, additional reporting by Naveen Thukral in Singapore, editing by Chizu Nomiyama)