CAIRO, Jul 8 (Aswat Masriya) - Egypt's General Authority for Supply Commodities (GASC) bought 180,000 tonnes of wheat from Russia and Ukraine in a tender on Wednesday, to produce subsidised bread, the state agency MENA reported.

GASC procures strategic commodities for the Egyptian state, the world's largest importer of wheat.  

Mamdouh Abdel Fattah, the vice president of GASC said the authority bought 120,000 tonnes from Russia and 60,000 tonnes from Ukraine.

Egypt bought the wheat at an average price of $212.26 a tonne. The wheat is due to be shipped to Egypt in the period between August 11 and 20.    

This is the second procurement of wheat by the Egyptian state since the beginning of the new fiscal year, which started in July. 

On Friday, Egypt bought 60,000 tonnes of Romanian wheat at a price of $212.47 a tonne. After the Friday purchase, Egypt's Supplies Minister Khaled Hanafi said the strategic reserves of local and imported wheat will suffice until the first week of January.  

In the first three quarters of the previous fiscal year, Egyptian imports of wheat were worth $1.63 billion, according to the most recently available figures by Egypt's central bank.