USDA to resurvey unharvested corn and soybean acres

The USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) will conduct a resurvey of corn and soybean acreage not yet harvested in five US states this spring, the agency said in a statement after the publication of this month’s Wasde.

The resurvey could lead to a readjustment of its January Wasde estimates of the the US harvest, planting, yields, production, and stocks.

“There was significant unharvested acreage of corn in Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin; and soybean acreage not yet harvested in Michigan, North Dakota and Wisconsin,” the USDA said.

No exact timeline has been given for when adjustments to this month’s estimates will be made because of farmer’s ability to complete the harvest amid possible changes to weather and the time taken to recontact farmers by the agency.

But these are expected to come in the spring, the agency added.

Analysts had expected to see a cut to production and ending stocks in this month's Wasde for both corn and soybeans. 

But soybean ending stocks were left unchanged at 475 million bu because of an unexpected small 8 million bu lift to production – which landed at 3.558 billion bu – and a marginal cut to beginning stocks and imports. 

And for corn, an expected 123 million bu cut to ending stocks was not quite met with totals coming in just 18 million bu lower to 1.892 billion bu. Yet a 1 bu/ha lift to yields to 169 bu/ha unexpectedly lifted production just 0.2% to 13.692 billion bu.