Argentina: Expanding Soybeans, Sunflower

Avatar for Matt Hopkins By Scott C. Lucas|8 October 2007

While planting has not yet started for the 2007/08 soybean season, early indications are that the planted area will increase by more than 5% to 17 million hectares (Ha). Assuming yields in line with the long-term average, production for 2007/08 will reach 47 million metric tons (MMT) — less than a 0.5% decrease from last year. Yields for the 2006/07 season were higher than normal due to exceptional weather.

Sunflower planting is underway and has reached 10% of the Ministry of Agriculture’s projected 2.75 million Ha for 2007/08. However, the 2007/08 planted area will surpass that of the previous campaign by 10%, according to USDA-FAS, which predicts it to reach 4.5 million Ha due to high world demand for vegetable oils and favorable prices for sunflowerseed oil combined with relatively low costs of production for the crop. Total production is expected to reach 4.5 MMT in 2007/08, an increase of 25% over the Ministry of Agriculture’s estimated 3.6 MMT for 2006/07.