November 11, 2008
Lower forecasts for US corn, soy
The US Department of Agriculture again lowered its forecasts for US corn and soy production in a report issued Monday (November 10).
The last reductions the USDA made for corn and soy production were in an unusual "corrected" forecast about two weeks ago, on October 28, after USDA officials said they discovered discrepancies in their databases.
In Monday's regularly published monthly supply and demand report, the USDA said the latest reduction for corn production is due to a slight reduction in yield expectations and drops the corn production forecast to 12.02 billion bushels, down from the October 28 forecast of 12.033 billion bushels. The last regularly scheduled October 10 supply and demand report had put corn production this year at 12.2 billion bushels.
The predicted corn yield and production reductions are small, though, the USDA said.
"If realized, this will be the second highest [corn] yield on record behind 2004 and production will be the second largest behind last year," the USDA said.
The new USDA forecast for US soy production this year is 2.921 billion bushels, up from the October 28 "corrected" forecast of 2.938 billion bushels.
"Soy production is...down 17 million bushels based on lower soybean yield of 39.3 bushels per acre," the USDA said in Monday's report.
The new and lower forecast for the national average soy yield per acre is down from the October prediction of 39.5 bushels/acre.
