November 12, 2007

 

US 2007/08 corn stocks seen down at 100 million bushels

 

 

The US Department of Agriculture on Friday (November 9) lowered its forecast for corn ending stocks by 100 million bushels, citing lower-than-expected production for the 2007-08 marketing year.

 

The reduction came just a month after the USDA raised its expectations for corn ending stocks by 322 million bushels in October.

 

The new ending stocks forecast was set at 1.897 billion bushels, down from the 1.997 billion bushels predicted in October and the 1.675 billion bushel total predicted in September.

 

The USDA, in its November World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report, said, "Projected US ending stocks of corn for 2007/08 are lowered 100 million bushels this month as lower production more than offsets reduced feed and residual use."

 

The new production forecast is 13.168 billion bushels, down from the October forecast of 13.318 billion bushels, because of lower yields, the USDA said.

 

The USDA's latest average yield forecast is for 153 bushels per acre. That's down from the 154.7-bushel-per-acre forecast last month, but the new figure would still be "the second highest on record behind 2004," the USDA said in its Crop Production report, which was also released Friday.

 

"Forecast yields are lower than last month across the northern and western corn belt and adjacent areas of the Great Plains where actual harvest results are revealing that the impact of the hot, dry conditions during pollination was worse than initially expected," the USDA said in the Crop Production report.

 

Along with the decreased production forecast this month, the USDA also lowered its forecast for some domestic corn usage. The forecast for feed and residual use was lowered in November to 5.65 billion bushels, a 50-million bushel decrease from October. The September forecast was for 5.85 billion.

 

The USDA left its forecast for corn usage for ethanol production unchanged this month at 3.2 billion bushels after lowering it back in October by 100 million bushels from the September forecast of 3.3 billion.

 

The US ethanol industry used 2.15 billion bushels of corn in the 2006-07 marketing year.