No major frost damage seen to late US soy, corn crop

After one of the worst starts to corn and soybean planting in living memory, the weather is set to give farmers a break across the US Midwest, with frost likely to set in late and not trouble the crop or harvest, Global Grains South America conference heard on Wednesday.

Kyle Tapley, senior agricultural economist with weather forecaster Maxar, told delegates in Sao Paulo that initial fears that the late start to planting could see frost damage the crops were overdone.

“I don’t think we are going to see a frost that will damage a large part of the crop. The bulk of the damage was done in the spring. We are still figuring out how much damage was done,” he said.

Adding that wetter weather would ease lingering dryness in Iowa and favour late development, Tapley said his forecasts showed that the Midwest would receive normal precipitation.

Corn and soybeans in the US were planted very late this year as flooding across the Midwest prevented farmers from putting seed in the ground.

Maxar expects production of corn in the 2019/20 marketing year to fall almost 10% to 12.8 billion bushels, with soybeans to fall almost 20% on the year to 3.66 billion bushels.

Looking forward to the wheat crop, Tapley said areas that grow hard red winter wheat were expected to be drier than normal over spring.