Poor weather contributes to total crop area drop in US

Wet fall weather in the US is largely behind a projected reduction in total planted acreage in 2010.

 

The USDA projected that farmers will plant 247.3 million acres of the eight major crops, down 1.6 million from 2009. The eight major crops are corn, wheat, soy, barley, oats, sorghum, cotton and rice.

 

It cited the cool, wet fall weather, which delayed summer-crop harvesting and, along with a weaker price outlook, led to sharply lower winter wheat seedings. The 37.1 million acres of winter wheat is the lowest total since 1913.

 

 

Rich Feltes, MF Global senior vice president of research, said overall the USDA's planted acreage estimate will climb.

 

"The total planted area for all crops is too low," Feltes said. "The actual acres that we get in March will be higher and the final planted acres might be even higher." The USDA will issue its survey-based prospective plantings report on March 31.

 

In 2009, some analysts said the USDA provided a poor benchmark for acreage in its March planting intentions report by underestimating overall seedings. At the time analysts questioned whether farmers would leave millions of acres completely idle, as the USDA projected.

 

Those "missing acres" turned up in a June USDA acreage report, mostly through added corn acres, which sent the market tumbling.

 

The USDA added in Friday's report that a 2.4 million acre reduction in land enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Programme (CRP) will have a limited effect on acreage, as "much of the land that came out of CRP due to expiring contracts was in the Great Plains and mostly suitable for wheat."

 

The USDA added that historically only a limited portion of former CRP land actually returns to production, particularly in the first year.