The impact of the impaired terminal on world food and futures markets is still small while harvesting of grains in Brazil remains nascent, a port official said.
But if repairs at the Guaruja Grain Terminal (TGG) at Santos drag on into March, world food prices could push higher and buyers in Asia and Europe may face long delays loading ships when the global grain trade turns to the South American harvest.
In a few weeks the flow of grains from the center-west farm belt will peak in Brazil, which the U.S. Agriculture Department expects to be the biggest exporter of soybeans this year.
Recently, the dry bulk carrier MV Milagro knocked into the water one of the four grain loaders at TGG, the main soybean, meal and corn export terminal at Santos, Brazil's largest grain port.
"For now it's a little kitten, but if it hangs around and grows, it can turn into a tiger of a problem for grain exports, especially if you throw in some rainy weather," the head of a soy desk at a major European trading company said.
Grain loading stops when it rains in Brazil because none of the local terminals have covers to keep water from falling into the ships' holds and spoiling the dry bulk cargoes.
TGG said operations are totally halted while authorities carry out repair work. The TGG terminal and its four grain loaders moved 5.8 million tonnes of soybeans, meal and corn in 2011, compared with the 3.9 million tonnes shipped through the other grains terminal at Santos, TEG.
Santos accounts for about 30 percent of Brazil's exports of soy and corn. Brazil should export about 33 million tonnes of soybeans this year, according to the grain crushing industry, and 10 million tonnes of corn exports has been typical over the past few years, making it the third biggest exporter of corn.
TGG, which has as its main stakeholders local railway ALL , farm commodities processor Bunge Ltd and local soy producer Amaggi, did not give an estimate of how long it would take to replace the loader that it called "totally destroyed".
Nor did it say if or when the other three loaders could receive ships again. The four loaders service one berth simultaneously.
Grain loading capacity is still believed to be comfortable using TEG, which was unaffected by the accident.
Brazil is still in the early harvest period of its soybean crop. The leading producer states of Mato Grosso, Parana and Goias started harvesting in January but have collected a relatively small part of the crops.
Harvesting over the soy belt will pick up speed and peak in March and April, which will make a quick removal of the downed loader and resumption of loading at TGG urgent.
Brazil is the world's No. 2 soy producer after the United States. It is now harvesting a soy crop of 70 million tonnes and a corn crop of about 60 million tonnes.
TGG said it was working to resume operations as quickly as possible and said the three remaining bulk loaders were intact.
But the likelihood of a long delay before the fourth loader can be replaced or repaired means Brazil's grain export capacity could still come under pressure weeks from now if new equipment is not in place by the time harvest peaks, grain traders said.
And five days of Carnival festivities are set to start on Friday, which tends to put off serious work in the country for a week.
A mechanical failure on a loader's conveyor belt at the No. 2 grains port Paranagua a few years ago took a month to repair, meaning the replacement of the TGG loader, shown twisted and lurched into the sea in photos, could take much longer.
Together, Paranagua and Santos account for about 55-60 percent of Brazil's capacity to ship soybeans, meal and corn.
If TGG is unable to get its remaining three shiploaders running in the coming weeks, other ports such as Paranagua, 300 mil
