Brazil soy harvest hits 35%, corn plantings ramp up: AgRural

A dearth of rain in Parana, the second largest soybean producing state in Brazil, helped farmers bring in the beans over the past week, according to consultants AgRural, with nationwide harvest rates jumping 10% to 35% by Thursday.

The figures compare with 47% at this stage last year and 37% average over the past five years.

The weekly increase was largely down to harvest rates in Parana, which rose from 11% to 35% in seven days, the analysts said, with the harvest in the number one producing state of Mato Grosso rising to 70%.

“Good progress also registered in other states, such as Mato Grosso do Sul (25% to 39%) and Goiás (30% to 41%),” the consultants said in their weekly report.

In the rest of the country, the harvest reached 11% in Santa Catarina, 38% in São Paulo, 29% in Minas Gerais, 5% in Bahia, 1% in Maranhão, 7% in Tocantins, 1% in Piauí, 13% in Pará and 60% in Rondônia. The only state that has not started its harvest is Rio Grande do Sul, where the harvest usually begins in mid-March, AgRural said.

AgRural said it will release a new estimate for the 2017/18 soybean crop on Monday morning.

In terms of corn, the consultants said planting in the centre-south of Brazil had reached 63%, in line with 64% of the average of five years, but behind the 75% of last year, which had the fastest planting on record.

This means that 37% of the Center-South area – some 3.9 million hectares – will be planted in March.

“This is not exactly a problem, since the window extends for the first half of March in areas of Paraná, São Paulo, Minas Gerais, Goiás and Mato Grosso do Sul,” the report said, adding that the size of the crop will depend on the weather between April and July.

As of Thursday, 24% of the summer corn area was harvested in the Center-South of Brazil.