Argentina: Buenos Aires Grain Exchange further reduces Argentina’s barley production forecast

The Buenos Aires Grain Exchange (Bage) has trimmed Argentina's 2022-23 barley production forecast owing to frosts and persistent drought, while recent rain has improved conditions for soybean and corn planting, Argus reported on November 18.

Barley production is now expected to reach 4 mln t for the 2022-23 marketing year ending 30 November 2023, down by 200,000 tonnes from the previous forecast, after crops were affected by frosts in October and early November. The revised figure is lower than the US Department of Agriculture's estimate of 4.5 mln tonnes and below a record 5.3 mln tonnes produced in 2021-22.

The south of La Pampa and Buenos Aires agricultural regions were most affected by the frosts, while downward revisions to production in the north of La Pampa, western and south-eastern Buenos Aires were also driven by the lack of rainfall.

Meanwhile, recent rain has improved conditions for Argentina's soybean planting, which was 12pc complete as of 16 November, with 16.7 mln hectares (ha) projected for 2022-23. But this was still more than 16 percentage points lower than a year earlier.

As for corn, planting was 23.6pc complete as of 16 November, rising by just 0.2 percentage points compared with last week, with the 2022-23 projected area at 7.3 mln ha, down from 7.7 mln ha last year.

Increased moisture levels slightly improved corn crop conditions, with 11pc of the crop rated good-to-excellent as of 16 November, up from 9pc a week ago, but significantly below 91pc a year earlier. And the portion of crop rated poor-to-very poor fell to 28pc from 34pc last week.

Argentina's sunflower seed sowing reached 86.6pc of the 2 mln ha estimated for the 2022-23 crop, with the Buenos Aires and La Pampa agricultural regions increasing planting in the reporting week.

Sunflower conditions also improved slightly, with 8pc of the crop rated good-to-excellent, compared with 5pc the previous week and 41pc a year earlier.

And Argentinian wheat threshing was at 10pc as of 16 November, down by 7.6 percentage points year on year. Recent rain has slowed the deterioration of early crops, which allowed Bage to maintain its wheat output projection at 12.4 mln tonnes for the 2022-23 marketing year.

Wheat crop conditions remained unchanged in the last reporting week, with 8pc of the crop rated good-to-excellent, in line with the previous week, and lower than 50pc a year earlier. But the share of crops rated poor-to-very poor fell by one percentage point from the previous week to 56pc.

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