Farmers planted slightly more land to soybeans than they planned in June, analysts said ahead of a USDA report that will provide the best evidence yet of this year’s crops. In surveys by Reuters and Bloomberg, analysts forecast soybean plantings at a record 85.3 million acres, up 1 percent from the USDA’s March survey of intentions and 2-percent more than the mark set last year. The result would be a crop of 3.88 billion bushels, the second-largest on record, based on the department’s estimates of yields and abandonment rates for fields. Following last year’s record-setting crop, the U.S. stockpile would grow and farm-gate prices would remain under pressure for another year.
The USDA is scheduled to release the annual Acreage report on Tuesday at noon ET, along with the quarterly Grain Stocks report. Bloomberg says the corn supply would be the largest on June 1 since 1988 at the level expected by analysts of 4.557 billion bushels.
On average, analysts expect corn plantings of 89.2 million acres – matching the USDA’s March survey – and wheat plantings of 55.8 million acres, 1-percent larger than the March estimate due to larger sowings of durum and spring wheat. The corn harvest would be 13.8 billion bushels, the third-largest ever, and wheat would be a medium-sized crop of nearly 2.2 billion bushels, again based on the USDA’s projection of yields and abandonment of fields.
The average corn price for this year’s crop would be the lowest in six years and the average soybean price would be lowest in nine years, according to USDA projections. Farm income is expected to fall steeply due to low prices for the two most widely grown U.S. crops, although processors, livestock producers and foodmakers would benefit from low prices for materials they buy in huge volumes. Comparatively low grain prices would help drive down food-price inflation, forecast for a moderate 2.5 percent this year. The 20-year average is a 2.6 percent annual increase.
In a Bloomberg survey, analysts said sorghum plantings would total 8.2 million acres, up 4 percent from the March survey of growers and up nearly 9 percent from last year. China became an eager buyer of U.S. sorghum last year, so growers are planting more of the drought-hardy crop. If plantings are as large as analysts expect, the crop would be about 453 million bushels, the largest since 2008.