July 11, 2008

 

Brazil's Sao Paulo doubles wheat harvest despite sugarcane production 

Despite concerns that booming sugarcane ethanol investments in Sao Paulo state would cut into the state's food production, farmers here have more than doubled wheat output and raised corn production by 13 percent, the state's Agriculture Department said Thursday (July 10, 2008).

 

Sao Paulo is responsible for more than half of Brazil's sugarcane production, but is also a major supplier of grains.

 

Winter corn production is seen rising by 13 percent to 915,000 metric tonnes, with yields up 10 percent to 3,753 kilograms of corn per hectare.

 

Sao Paulo plants corn in the winter and in the spring for fall harvesting.

 

Corn is Brazil's No. 2 crop behind soybeans, of which Brazil is the world's second-largest producer behind the US.

 

Wheat production is seen rising 102 percent to 190,000 tonnes, the largest growth area for wheat ever recorded in Sao Paulo.

 

Planted area for wheat in the state rose by around 84 percent to 75,000 hectares.

 

Sao Paulo is Brazil's richest and most important industrial state.

 

Brazilian politicians have said that Brazil can produce fuel crops like sugarcane without taking away from grain production.

 

Brazil is second only to the US as the world's leading grain and oilseed producer.