Drought is ravaging fall-seeded crops and delaying the seeding of spring crops in two of the world’s biggest grain producing countries.
Since April 1, northeastern China has received only 10 to 30 percent of its normal precipitation. And in India, where farmers just endured the worst drought in 15 years, the monsoon rains came about a week late.
Hot, dry weather is affecting corn and soybean plantings, but it was last year’s similar conditions that set the tone for the recent winter wheat harvest in the two Asian countries.
Read Also
Canada’s oat crop looks promising
The oat crop looks promising and that’s a good thing because demand is strong.
The United States Department of Agriculture attaché in New Delhi released a report May 30 cutting India’s 2003 wheat production forecast to 67 million tonnes from 70 million.
“That’s an interesting development,” said Canadian Wheat Board weather and crop surveillance analyst Guy Ash.
“Dropping it down to 67 million tonnes would be a fair drop for them.”
Last year, India produced 72 million tonnes.
The USDA has yet to revise its official production estimate for India, but there is other evidence to corroborate the attaché’s findings, said Ash.
“Production seems to be dropping off from internal estimates within Pakistan and India.”
The drought extends into Pakistan, where officials have lowered production estimates to 19.3 million tonnes from 21 million.
Exports from last year’s Indian wheat crop are expected to reach a record five million tonnes. Lower supplies and higher prices for the new crop should make the country less competitive in 2003-04, said analysts.
China’s drought isn’t having much impact on the winter wheat crop, which is primarily grown in the north China plain where the dry patches are nothing like the northeast’s desert-like conditions.
Production is estimated at 87 million to 90 million tonnes, down slightly from last year’s 91 million. That’s due to the long trend of reduced plantings, which has resulted in China’s smallest wheat acreage since the mid-1960s.
The Chinese government is discouraging growers from seeding low quality wheat because it has large supplies.
“They have stockpiled an awful lot of grain in China and it’s going to take some time for them to chew through that grain and require imports,” said Ash.
The big concern in China is the corn crop. Agriculture Canada market analyst Joe Wang said China just dropped its seeding estimate by one million acres from last year’s crop.
He said the drought is “pretty bad” in the northeast where most corn and soybeans are grown. Corn out of the ground looks short.
“It’s too early to say how much the yield will be affected, but definitely the yield looks like it will be lower than average.”
China’s primary government exporting company is estimating significantly lower corn exports, which should buoy U.S. corn prices and Canadian barley prices, said Wang.
China’s weather woes supported a rally in Chicago soy futures late last week. With some analysts predicting a 10 percent decline in soybean yields from the 2002 crop, traders feel the world’s top soybean importer might need large imports next year.
Monsoon rains have improved the corn and soybean outlook in India, where farmers were getting desperate. This year’s rains were late arriving. In late May and early June, temperatures rose to 50 C, killing 1,300 people.
Rains hit the northeastern coast of India June 5. Government officials said the delay will not hinder agricultural production.
