The center-west is forecast to harvest a near-record crop this season due to excellent rain over the past weeks. States in the region such as No. 1 soy grower Mato Grosso and No. 4 Goias, are typically earliest to plant and harvest in Brazil.
Rainfall on Mato Grosso soy fields ranged from 334 millimeters to 491 millimeters so far this month, that is 11 to 91 percent more than historical averages for the entire month of January, meteorologist Somar said in a daily soy weather bulletin.
The heavy, incessant rains in some areas of the state were slowing early harvest work. Losses were negligible as not many areas were ready to harvest.
Local grain analysts Celeres estimated that 6 percent of the state's crop, which should reach a record 22 million tonnes, has been harvested up to last week, after Mato Grosso started early harvest in late December.
"The first 10 days of February will be relatively favorable to harvest in Mato Grosso, because you won't see the same level of rains witnessed in the past weeks," Somar weather specialist Marco Antonio dos Santos.
The state's crop will dry faster now that rains are due to let up, with 40 percent of the fields only a couple weeks away from harvest.
The soy harvest across the grain belt in Brazil has reached 3 percent, up slightly from the 2 percent this time last year, Celeres said.
"There will be only isolated showers... not incessant ones," he said, adding that rains had been relentless in January in the center-west. "We're going to see a big jump in harvesting in the coming days. There is a lot of soy that is dry and ready to harvest, which producers have been unable to get at in the past weeks."
It will take another couple of weeks at least before any of these early harvested soybeans reach the main ports in the south of Brazil. The local crushing industry will snap up some of the early harvest to replenish their stocks.
SOUTH TO RECEIVE MORE RAIN
While the center-west states dry out in the coming weeks, Brazil's southern grain states of Parana and Rio Grande do Sul are in line for more rains in early February.
"Between February 4 and 8, rains will return to the extreme south of the country, while in most of the center-west ... (and other regions) a dry air mass dominates," Somar said in an extended 10-day forecast.
The western part of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil's No. 3 soy producer, is in dire need of moisture. It is still 79 percent behind average rainfall levels for January and it's soybeans are still months away from harvest.
Irreversible losses have already been racked up in the state and in No. 2 soybean state Parana, also in the south, due to dry weather over the November and December.