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Argentina’s 2012-13 corn harvest is expected at 28 million to 30 million tonnes, Deputy Agriculture Secretary Oscar Solis said Jan. 14, increasing expectations after President Cristina Fernandez forecast a crop of 24.5 million tonnes last year.
“There is a lot of corn, and in exceptional condition,” Solis told Reuters. “The range will be roughly between 28 million and 30 million tonnes.”
The projection puts the ministry in line with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), which earlier upped its 2012-13 Argentine corn crop estimate to 28 million tonnes from 27.5 million tonnes.
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The season started with heavy August-November storms that flooded wide swathes of the Pampas Grains Belt, raising fear that many areas would not get planted.
The rains have since given way to extended stretches of sunny weather, allowing farmers to get most areas planted and setting the stage for healthy yields.
- Argentine soy planting advanced quickly in the week ending July 10 to cover more than 90 per cent of the targeted area, easing fears of a crop shortfall that could keep world food prices high.
The Buenos Aires Grains Exchange said recent sunny weather firmed topsoils enough to finally allow farmers to drive heavy seeding machines into fields that had until recently been turned to mush by a series of violent rainstorms.
“Farmers in western Buenos Aires province were able to take advantage of this rain-free period and plant more late-seeded fields, including low-lying areas that had until recently been waterlogged,” the exchange’s report said.
Farmers, worried about diseases that could strike soy plants in areas that remain waterlogged, are keeping a sharp eye out for fungal outbreaks such as Asian soy rust and frog-eye leaf spot that thrive in soggy conditions. “Some areas that still cannot be planted with soy will be seeded with corn,” the exchange said. “Growers are looking for alternatives to make sure fields are productive.” — Reuters
- U.K. wheat imports surpassed one million tonnes during the first five months of the 2012-13 season, exceeding the total for the entire previous marketing year, customs data showed Jan. 15.
Imports had soared this season after a poor wheat crop in Britain with yields slumping to a 23-year low and quality hurt by high diseases levels.
Britain is expected to be a net importer of wheat in 2012-13 for the first time in more than a decade.
- Italy’s stock market is considering adding more commodity futures contracts as it gears up to launch Europe’s first futures market for durum wheat later this month.
“We are studying other derivatives on other agricultural products,” Borsa Italiana Commodities head Ennio Arlandi said on the sidelines of a conference. He would not specify which.
Borsa Italiana, which runs the Milan exchange and is controlled by the London Stock Exchange, will launch its new AGREX futures for durum wheat on Jan. 21 in a move to help Europe’s pasta makers offset price volatility.
Italy is one of the world’s leading producers of durum wheat, which is used mainly to produce pasta in the continent and couscous in North Africa and the Middle East. — Reuters
