The United States Department of Agriculture’s planting intention survey threw a curve ball at the markets early this week.
Analysts had expected that the more favourable treatment of corn in the new U.S. farm bill, plus the tight stock levels, would cause American farmers to shift more acres from soybeans to corn.
But that’s not what farmers are thinking, according to the USDA survey.
It says soybean acreage is expected to be down only one percent and corn to stay the same as last year. Analysts said perhaps farmers were paying less attention to the farm bill and more on their
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USDA’s August corn yield estimates are bearish
The yield estimates for wheat and soybeans were neutral to bullish, but these were largely a sideshow when compared with corn.
rotations, the high cost of nitrogen fertilizer and strong world
demand for oilseeds.
Analysts were also surprised by the sharp cut in spring wheat acreage, which is down seven percent.
But because winter wheat acreage is six percent larger, overall wheat area is up two percent.
The planting report also covers smaller crops that don’t make the headlines. The news on them generally favours western Canadian farmers.
American farmers told the USDA they planned to seed 1.25 million acres of canola, down 14 percent from last year, due mainly to a big drop in North Dakota, the key canola state in the U.S.
Oil-type sunflower area is expected to be steady at 2.12 million acres while confection and birdseed sunflower area is expected to fall 14 percent to 394,000 acres.
An expected 2.83 million acres will be seeded to durum, down three percent from last year. That is the first bit of good news for the durum price outlook in a while. North Africa, the world’s key importing region, is expecting a bumper durum crop after several years of drought.
Oats area is seen at 4.83 million acres, down four percent from last year, mainly because of big cuts in North Dakota and Minnesota.
That sounds positive for prices, but with expectations of better weather, USDA forecasts that harvested acreage will be 2.2 million acres, up five percent from last year.
Dry edible bean acreage is expected to drop by 21 percent to 1.52 million acres.
One reason spring wheat area is expected to drop is because the price prospects for barley are better.
Growers said they expected to seed 5.38 million acres of barley, up six percent from last year.
