While the soybean harvest is proceeding, the productive disaster caused by the drought is confirmed, and which it can cause if it doesn’t rain urgently.
With 54% progress in the harvest, 20 points less than last year’s threshing, the Rosario Stock Exchange made new negative adjustments.
From April to May, the national yield decreases and drops to 17.5 qq/ha, the lowest level in the last 15 years. Yes, production decreases by 1.5 million tons in one month and 21.5 million tons in total are expected.
This way there will be a 56% less soy than planned at the start of the campaign.
“The biggest adjustments concern La Pampa, which has dropped by 3.6 qq/ha in the last 30 days. The unprecedented frosts of February, the lack of water and the heat are manifesting themselves in the first choice soybean farmland. Buenos Aires and Córdoba continue in the list of production cuts. The discount in the provincial yield for both is 1.2 qq/ha,” they described.
Given the lower supply of soybeans on the local market, the industry had to go out to buy goods from Brazil and Paraguay. Between January and April, 2.7 million tons were imported against the 890,000 tons that had been purchased abroad in the same period of 2022. And they should reach 10 million tons at the end of the year.
In any case, it is expected that soy milling is at its lowest in 18 years.
Given this scenario, and adding the other supply chains, the decline in foreign exchange revenue calculated by the Chamber of Petroleum Industry of the Argentine Republic (CIARA) for this year is US$ 18,777 million, considering the lower production and exportable balances.
But the drought does not subside in several productive regions and now the sowing of wheat is starting to get complicated.
“Due to financial needs, the 2023/24 wheat sowing should be able to exceed 7 million hectares. However, with an almost arid scenario like that of 2009, the probabilities of reducing the cultivated areas in Córdoba, La Pampa , Santa Fe and in central and northern Buenos Aires,” the Rosario Stock Exchange report remarked.
According to the work, rains that cover more than a quarter of the current land needs of the Pampa region are needed so that the area’s coverage does not decrease compared to the 2021/22 campaign.
Source: Clarin
