WASHINGTON — Following a prolonged period of hot and dry weather across much of Brazil’s growing region, rains have finally returned. While early planted and maturing soybeans were unable to benefit from these rains, yielding below initial expectations, later planted soybeans and the safrinha corn crop are reaping the rain’s benefit. However, overall soybean production is expected to be down from last year. Nationwide harvest of soybeans is now just over halfway complete, up from 35% last year and a 5-year average of 37%. While states like Rio Grande do Sul are just beginning harvest, typical for this southern state, others like Mato Grosso are edging closer to completion. By the end of February, harvest in Mato Grosso had reached 87.7% complete, still well ahead of 70% for the 5-year average and last year’s pace. Yields in Parana are improving as well, but production estimates still have the crop coming in about 15% less than last season. Harvest is already past the halfway mark in the state, and nearly twice the pace of last year.
Planting of Brazil’s safrinha corn continues to make good progress. Mato Grosso is nearly fully planted and has received ample, if at times a little too much, rainfall. Parana is two-thirds planted, and Mato Grosso was about one-third planted by late February. While rains are great for germination of the crop, the key timeframe comes during April and May when the corn crop reaches pollination. The long-range forecast for the month of April shows generally favorable precipitation trends across much of the growing region, especially for Mato Grosso. Some drier than normal areas are possible in Mato Grosso do Sul and western Parana, though. However, when compared to April of last season, the state of Parana is expected to trend much wetter. Looking ahead to May, monthly precipitation trends look favorable for eastern-central Brazil, but some drier trends compared to both last year and normal are possible for Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul.
In the US, colder than normal temperatures will stick around in the north until the weekend, when temperatures begin to moderate. The West, however, is expected to continue to trend colder to much colder than normal through much of next week. The South Central will see warmer to much warmer trends beginning today for some and spread across the remainder of the region by Friday. By Saturday, warmer than normal trends are expected for the South Central, Southeast, and much of the Midwest. These trends spread into the Mid-Atlantic by Sunday, as cooler trends creep back into the Plains. Following a much colder than normal first half to March, especially across the Central US, the second half of the month is expected to trend a bit warmer than normal in the Northeast and Southwest, although near to cooler than normal trends hang around in the Central US. As compared to last year, the second half of March is forecast to trend warmer to much warmer in the Northeast and Midwest, but cooler to much cooler in the South Central.
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