SASKATOON — One of the world’s biggest bean buyers had a big rebound year in 2024-25.
Mexico’s production of the pulse was 1.01 million tonnes, a 41 per cent increase over the previous year, according to a new report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS).
The previous year’s crop of 603,357 tonnes was record-small due to drought. Smaller, less intensive producers were forced to abandon their crops.
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Sam Peck, a trader with Jack’s Bean International in Colorado, said seeding of the 2025-26 spring crop will start in May in Chihuahua and work its way south through Durango, Zacatecas and Nayarit through July.
“They need some water to get a decent start, I can tell you that right now,” he said.
“I don’t think they’re out of the woods.”
Mexico has been dealing with three consecutive years of drought, and it is still extremely dry in the northern part of the country, according to the North American Drought Monitor.
Peck doesn’t know how many acres Mexican farmers will plant, but he doesn’t expect area to drop “by any means.”
The spring crop accounts for 82 per cent of Mexico’s total sown area, with the fall crop making up the remainder.
Mexico’s beans are 85 per cent dependent on rainfall and 15 per cent on irrigation, so severe droughts like the one that occurred in 2023-24 can be devastating.
Growers planted a total of 3.36 million acres of beans in 2024-25, a 32 per cent increase over the previous year.
But harvested area has declined by 20 per cent over the past decade.
Mexico’s production has been hampered by lack of certified seed, inadequate irrigation infrastructure and adverse weather conditions, according to the FAS.
“Furthermore, inefficient handling and storage practices contribute to significant post-harvest losses, while security issues impact labour access and crop shipments,” stated the report.
The dismal 2023-24 crop led to record-high imports of 383,556 tonnes that year.
The 2024-25 total is estimated at 299,593 tonnes, a 21 per cent decrease. But that is still more than double the volumes of a typical year.
Peck said buying has dried up of late.
“It has been very quiet into Mexico over the last 30 days,” he said.
Buyers have decent supplies of the crop, but they are also nervous about putting any further sales on the books due to the possibility of retaliatory tariffs on imported beans from the U.S.
Peck does not think that will happen because wheat, corn and beans are staple food items in Mexico. But buyers remain anxious.
What happens in Mexico is critically important for North America’s bean markets.
“They drive the bus,” he said.
“Everybody else just puts gasoline in.”
The U.S. is Mexico’s top supplier of beans, accounting for 75 per cent of 2024-25 imports. Canada took second spot.
Mexico is the largest market for U.S. black and pinto beans.
But other players are making headway in that market due in part to the Presidential Anti-Inflation Decree program.
That program temporarily eliminated import tariffs on beans from non-free trade agreement partners, facilitating shipments from Brazil.
Brazil has gone from importing 100,000 tonnes of black beans a year to exporting the crop.
Brazil used to get its beans from Argentina. Those beans will now be competing with U.S. and Canadian beans in other export markets.
That wasn’t a big deal last year because Argentina had a poor crop, but it could have a major impact on black bean markets in 2025-26, said Peck.
Mexico’s annual per capita bean consumption has declined precipitously over the past several decades, falling to 7.7 kilograms in 2024 from 24.7 kilograms in 1980, according to the FAS.
The drop is due to the time-consuming nature of cooking dry beans, rising consumption of beef and poultry, substitution with more affordable plant-based proteins such as lentils, rice and pasta, a rural exodus to urban centres, and the perception that beans are food for the poor.
The Government of Mexico is trying to decrease its reliance on imports by boosting bean production by 30 percent in six years.
It is setting up research centres to supply higher-yielding bean seeds. The goal is to provide nearly 25,000 tonnes of seeds, enough to plant 1.83 million acres of the crop.
