Australia: ABARE said 2006/07 barley crop will be down by 64% year-on-year because of severe draught

The nation's top commodities forecaster, the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE), released October 27 its revised crop production figures for 2006/07. Production of barley is tipped to suffer, The Age posed October 27.

ABARE says the barley crop is forecast to be 3.6 million tonnes this financial year, down 64 per cent on a year ago.

The downward revision of crop numbers is expected to wipe $6.2 billion from the value of production of the three key commodities in 2005/06. The figure is 35 per cent lower than 2005/06.

ABARE acting executive director Karen Schneider said the effect of the fall in crop sizes would have an impact on the broader economy.

"Taking into account this latest revision to the farm sector forecasts and the flow on effects on the rest of the Australian economy, the drought is estimated to reduce economic growth in Australia in 2006/07 by around 0.7 percentage points from what would otherwise have been achieved," she said.

And ABARE is not optimistic about the outlook for summer rains.

"The rainfall outlook for summer crops is not promising," it said.

"The chances of exceeding the median rainfall for the November-January period are between 30 and 40 per cent for northern NSW and south east Queensland, with some areas have a 25-30 per cent chance.

"There is also a moderate to strong shift in the odds toward warmer than normal conditions.

"Averaged over the coming three months, the chances are between 60 and 75 per cent of higher than average maximum temperatures across the eastern half of Australia, and 75-85 per cent over much of southern Queensland."