Argentine wheat healthy; more rains needed: government

Argentine 2011/12 wheat is in good shape though some areas need more rain in order to guarantee healthy crop development, the Agriculture Ministry said on Friday in a weekly report. Argentina, a leading global wheat exporter, has yet to forecast production this season but the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) sees output falling to 13.5 million tonnes from 15 million last season.
"Rains were registered during the week in Pigue and these were very helpful in terms of maintaining good conditions for the early development of crops," the ministry report said, referring to a district in south-western Buenos Aires province. Buenos Aires accounts for about half of the country's total wheat production. Despite the rainfall recorded during the week, dryness has started to set in southern parts of the province and in Cordoba, the country's No 2 wheat producer. By Thursday, when the report was updated, farmers had planted 99 percent of the estimated sowing area, advancing 1 point from the prior week and neck-and-neck with last season's planting pace.
CORN, SUNSEED Argentina is the world's second-largest corn supplier after the United States and farmers started to plant the first of the 2011/2012 crop in recent days in No 2 corn producing province, Santa Fe, the government said. The Ministry has not yet forecast new season planting area but many private analysts expect an increase from last season when the country produced 21.9 million tonnes.
Buenos Aires Grains Exchange put its first estimate for plantings of commercial-use corn at 3.5 million hectares, up from 3.2 million a year earlier. Growers have virtually finished bringing in the 2010/11 corn harvest, with just 1 percent of the estimated area remaining in the fields. With regard to 2011/12 sunseeds, the government said sowing was suffering delays because of dry soils in key growing areas. Argentina's Agriculture Ministry has not estimated sunflower area yet, but the Buenos Aires Grains Exchange estimates the crop's area at 1.86 million hectares.