OTTAWA – In the face of lower-than-expected yields, the federal government is reducing its estimates of the amount of spring wheat, canola and barley that prairie farmers are harvesting this autumn.
However, the Prairies still are on track to produce record durum and canola crops and the smallest overall wheat crop since the 1988 drought.
Based on a mid-September survey of farmers, Statistics Canada last week predicted:
- A 17.2 million-tonne spring wheat harvest, down from last year’s 23.1 million tonnes and down more than half a million tonnes from the last Statistics Canada estimate in July. Almost all of the production is on the Prairies.
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Both seeded acres and yields are down substantially this year.
- A durum crop of 4.7 million tonnes, up sharply from last year and up more than 200,000 tonnes from the July prediction. Increased acreage is the reason for the jump.
- A 7.4 million-tonne canola crop, which would be 35 percent larger than any previous crop. Since July, the production estimate has been trimmed by almost 700,000 tonnes.
- A barley crop of 11.7 million tonnes, down almost 10 percent from last year’s 13 million tonnes.
Over the summer, the federal agency’s barley production estimate fell by more than 700,000 tonnes in the face of lower-than-expected yields.
- The oat crop will be 3.8 million tonnes, with 3.5 million tonnes produced in Western Canada.
While canola acreage and production are soaring in the West, Ontario farmers also are taking in a record soybean harvest of 2.2 million tonnes, almost 20 percent larger than ever before.
