Global wheat output this year is threatened by a combination of drought, wet weather and flooding while corn and soy production should stay solid despite early seeding delays in the United States, a meteorologist told the Reuters Global Ags Forum on Wednesday. "A bad year for wheat, I do believe," said Donald Kenney, senior ag meteorologist for Cropcast, a division of MDA Information Systems.
Kenney said there was little hope that several large acreage areas of drought-stricken wheat in the US Plains would get any relief. "East central Kansas, central Oklahoma and north central Texas will see some rains beginning tomorrow and lasting through Sunday," Kenney said. "However, western Oklahoma, north-western Texas, south-western Kansas and south-eastern Colorado will likely continue to get short changed."
Worries about a stressful crop growing season boosted Chicago Board of Trade grain prices in April. Shrinking grain stocks in the United States, the world's top food exporter, coupled with strong global grain demand, heighten the need for a big crops in 2011. Excessive wet and cool weather is a threat to spring wheat seedlings in the US Northern Plains extending into Canada.
In Europe, dryness may resurface this summer in Ukraine and Belarus, but "I'd just like to mention that we don't currently expect another drought this summer in central Russia," Kenney said. Kenney said the weather problems were more expansive this year than usual and the outlook for crops is marginal for China and Europe.
Very little rain is expected for the foreseeable future in northern France, the southern United Kingdom, and the majority of Germany and Poland, with south-east Europe also rather dry for the next two weeks, Kenney said. "As for China, there may be a few light showers in far northern North China Plain (Shandong Province) today, but that's about it for them for the next two weeks," Kenney said.
Areas at greatest risk for drought include "Northern France, southern UK, Germany, western Poland, Czech and Slovak Republics, and western Hungary," he said. Concerns are also mounting about Australia's next wheat crop as a drier trend is forecast there for the next few months. Kenney told the ags forum that delays in seeding the US corn crop would persist for the next week to 10 days, but drier weather is expected in May, which should permit active plantings, and a satisfactory corn crop in America. China's corn output also should be okay. "I think corn will get off to a rocky start in China, but rains should help the crop later on. Also, it does look like favourable growing conditions for corn in the Midwest this summer," he said.