SAO PAULO (Reuters) — Brazilian farmers have started seeding their 2024-25 first corn crop, agribusiness consultancy AgRural has said, estimating work in the fields to have reached 4.2 per cent of the projected area in the key center-south region by late last week.
Brazil plants corn all year round, and the first crop usually represents about 20 per cent of national output, while the second crop, which is planted later, after soybeans are harvested on the same fields, accounts for 75 per cent.
AgRural said in a statement that planting efforts so far this season have been slower than a year earlier, when 7.5 per cent of the area had been sown, because farmers are taking a more cautious stance following frosts in mid-August.
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Work is still concentrated in Brazil’s southernmost state of Rio Grande do Sul, the consultancy said.
Planting should gain pace in the other southern states — Parana and Santa Catarina — next month, while in other areas of the country, farmers will only start seeding their first corn in late September or early October.
AgRural expects the area planted with corn for Brazil’s first crop to be 3.5 per cent lower in 2024-25 than in the previous season due to reduced prices and fears the La Nina climate phenomenon might lead to yield losses.
