April 3, 2012
Global corn yield to hit highest level in 2012-13
In 2012-13, the corn crop worldwide is to reach a record level, backing up the first rise in stocks in four seasons, and an all-time high in total grains output, the International Grains Council said.
World corn output will rise 4.2% to 900 million tonnes, as farmers scramble to exploit historically elevated prices by lifting plantings, the influential intergovernmental group said, in first forecasts for the next marketing year.
"Due to favourable pricing and good potential returns, total plantings are expected to reach an all-time high," the council said.
The expected rise in output will more than offset a rise in consumption to leave raise inventories by seven million-tonne over the season, the first increase since 2008-09.
Corn consumption will be constrained by a small fall in demand from US ethanol plants and competition with barley and wheat in the feed market.
Nonetheless, the "modest" rise in inventories will still leave them "quite tight" in 2012-13, the IGC said.
Indeed, at 129 million tonnes, they will translate into a stocks-to-use ratio of 14.4%, up four percentage points year on year but still low by historic standards.
The stocks-to-use ratio is a key measure of the availability of a commodity, and therefore of its price potential.
By country, inventories will rise in the US to 30.5 million tonnes, but fall in Brazil and China, the IGC forecast.
The increase in corn production, combined with larger barley and sorghum crops, will more than outweigh a drop in wheat output to lift the global grains harvest by 1.9% to 1.88 billion tonnes.
Overall grains sowings will rise by 1.9% to 540 million hectares, a 16-year high.
The wheat harvest is seen falling 15m tonnes to 681 million tonnes, "capped by a projected reduction in the average yield from the current year's high".
The IGC added that crops "may be smaller in Australia, Kazakhstan, Morocco and Ukraine, but better outcomes are expected in North America and Russia".
