Brazil’s soybean harvest reaches 43.9%, safrinha sowing 63.6%: Conab

Brazil’s soybean harvest advanced 9.9 percentage points in the week ending March 6 and reached 43.9% of the  43.3 million ha area sown area, the country’s food agency Conab said late Monday.

Field work is still 8.9 percentage points below last year’s 52.5% during the same period.

In Mato Grosso, Brazil’s main agricultural producing state, the harvest is nearing its conclusion and performance continues to be satisfactory.

In the southern state of Paraná, on the other hand, the continuous rains reduced the pace of harvesting and favored the occurrence of end of cycle diseases.

The only state harvest that hasn’t begun yet, Rio Grande do Sul, continues to face losses caused by drought, however, the recent rains have favored the few crops that are in the vegetative stage, Conab said.

Brazil is expected to harvest 152.8 million mt of soybeans in the 2022/23 crop year.

The state agency will update its estimates Thursday, March 9.

Corn

Despite the delay in soybean harvest, safrinha corn sowing reached 63.6% of the 16.9 million ha projected area on March 6. 

The figure represents a 14.9 percentage point weekly advance but remains below the 74.8% recorded in the same period in 2022.

The country is projected to harvest 94.9 million mt in the second corn crop.

In MT, the ideal period for sowing has ended, and around 8% of the area has not yet been planted yet.

According to Conab, the crops show good initial development in the state and in Paraná as well.

In the southern state, sowing is progressing slowly due to the persistence of rain.

The summer corn harvest reached a completion rate of 22.6%, a 5.9 percentage point week-on-week increase, and is also behind the previous year's 26.1% completion rate during the same period.

In Paraná, the high volume of rainfall hindered further progress in the harvest but benefited the crops in the reproductive stage.

In Rio Grande do Sul, the losses due to water deficit and high temperatures are consolidated.

Brazil is expected to harvest 26.4 million mt of corn in the summer corn crop in a 4.4 million ha area in the 2022/23 crop year.