Despite some rains that have occurred in recent weeks, drought has prevailed in much of the productive region. And the production losses so far are alarming as we look to 2023 with fewer currency regulations.
The crop that has already been affected by the lack of water – and late frosts – is wheat, with losses of 10 million tons, which have returned to 11.8 million tons. This campaign It is the worst of the last 8 campaigns.
So far, the crop covers 42.1% of the area under wheat cultivation and the accumulated production is 4.5 million tons. The average yield per hectare is 1,850 kilos, a far cry from last year’s 3,400 kilos.
In the face of this “productive disaster”, in terms of exports, adding barley as well, the drop would mean about 3.3 billion dollars less in the coming months, according to data from the prestigious Crea.
While these days, while it’s raining, producers advance with the planting of soybeans and corn, the two most important crops, but the delay is already very important and the sowing window (the optimal period for sowing) is over.
Over the weekend, there were thunderstorms of varying intensity that occurred in the north and center of the country. The most benefited area was the central-east of Santa Fe and a portion of the center of Buenos Aires, with rainfall exceeding 50 mm. Then, in the rest of the areas, they fell between 10 and 20 millimetres.
What many farmers have decided to get on with the work. In any case, Inta argued that the percentage of useful water in the soil profile (one metre) is less than 20% in most of the country. Only in the NEA and Buenos Aires (east) areas does this indicator show values between 40% and 70%, these being the maximum estimated values for the country.
According to data from the Buenos Aires grain exchange, soybean planting covers 37.1% of the planned 16.7 million hectares; that’s a year-over-year lag of 19 percentage points from last year. Both the NEA and NOA planting windows are longer, running through mid-January, so the estimated area can still be determined.
And corn planting covers 32.7% of the 7.3 million hectares, which marks an ongoing decline of 7 points from the past cycle.
Meanwhile, what is sown suffers the damage of lack of water and high temperatures of the last few days, which has exceeded 40 degrees for several days in a row.
The Rosario Stock Exchange warned this in the last week100,000 hectares of soybeans were added to the bad condition and another 200,000 hectares to the normal condition in the central region. In total, there are 300,000 bad hectares and 1.43 million regular hectares of prime soybeans under these conditions (8% and 35%, respectively). Similarly, 51% rate it as good and only 6% as very good.
And the body warned, in turn, that 600,000 hectares of second-grade soybeans (it’s planted behind wheat) could remain out of planting plans.
So that this delay will already have negative consequences for the April harvest. Continuing with the Crea data, he warns that delaying soy sowing from October-November (ideal date) to December-January means a 15.5% yield loss, and for corn, the delay from September-October (ideal date) to November-January results in 13.3% lower yield.
Given this lower grain production, foreign exchange earnings from the countryside will suffer significantly in 2023. From the Rosario Stock Exchange they raised several scenarios of what can happen with the gross harvest and, as a result, the liquidation of currencies.
And in all three cases there are significant losses. He calculated that the currencies generated by the field will drop between 21% and 36% in relation to this year which is expected to reach 45,000 million US dollars.
The estimate for soybeans ranges from 32 million (pessimistic scenario) to 46 million tons (optimistic scenario), while the projection for corn ranges from 41 million to 51 million tons.
Source: Clarin
