rainfall | Field 2 Field

April 4, 2022April 4, 2022

Soybean Harvest Disappoints South American Farmers

The South American soybean harvest is on the mind of many in the commodity markets this time of year. One expert says the Brazilian soybean harvest was about three-quarters complete, and, as of last week, the results may be a dramatic step down from last year. That could mean extra export opportunities for American soybeans in the months ahead.

Michael Cordonnier is an agronomist with Corn and Soybean Advisors, Incorporated, in Hinsdale, Illinois. The Brazil soybean harvest is 75-80 percent complete, and the Safriña, or second-corn crop, is all but completed at 99 percent after getting planted in the optimal window of time.

“I think the weather has been pretty good to allow the second-corn crop to get in the ground,” Cordonnier said while on the phone from his office in Illinois. “It’s off to a good start, but there’s still a long way to go. However, the market seems pretty confident that we’ll see a good-sized Safriña corn crop.”

In fact, he says there’s so much optimism around the potential of the corn crop that it’s pressuring Brazil’s domestic corn prices. There’s even more pressure on their domestic corn prices because the Brazilian real is strengthening when compared to the dollar. He said it’s trading at about 4.7 to the dollar, the strongest it’s been in a year.

“The South American market, at least in Brazil, is very confident that we could see a corn crop that’s 25 million tons larger than last year,” he said. “There is some concern about potential frost late in the season before the crop matures.

“La Niña is still out there,” Cordonnier added, “and it’s going to stay a couple of more months. That generally results in earlier-than-normal frost. Any frost, at all, before the end of June is important for the Safriña crop in Brazil.”

The pace is a lot slower in Argentina, where the South American crop expert says the corn is about ten percent harvested while the soybean crop is less than five percent in the bin. Early yields continue to be disappointing, early on, so he said it remains to be seen what will happen in Argentina.

South American growing areas struggled with a drought that, in some cases, stretched back to 2021 and earlier. He said some of those same areas are starting to see some rainfall. However, many areas are still looking for a consistent drink of water to recharge their soils.

The Brazilian soybean harvest may be disappointing, but the second corn crop is off to a good start, even though there’s a long way to maturity. (Photo from wikipedia)

“There’s still some dryness in east-central Brazil,” he said, “including the corn-producing states of Goias and Minas Gerais. It remains to be seen if the dryness gets resolved, but I’m not optimistic as South America is getting closer to what’s typically a dry season.

“The last summer rains usually occur in early May, so there’s a month or two left in the summer rainy season,” he added. “But it’s getting better.”

Cordonnier predicts a Brazil soybean harvest of 123 million tons, within a narrow range of an upside of 124 and a downside of 120. However, he says farmers are “pretty close” to being done with results in the low 120s. He predicts an Argentine soybean harvest of 39 million tons. “I’m a little bit on the low side,” he said. “But I expect the Buenos Aires Grain Exchange to lower their soybean number as well.

“I expect Brazil’s farmers to produce 112 million tons of corn,” Cordonnier said. “We’ll see what the weather does to and for the Safriña corn crop. In Argentina, I stayed at 49 million tons for their corn harvest, and the Grain Exchange agrees with me as they lowered their prediction to 49 million. I thought they should have been at that number a long time ago.”

His numbers continue to get narrower for both corn and soybeans in each country. The overall South American soybean crop is going to be down by a big number from last year.

“I have the South American soybean harvest at 171.6 million tons compared to 198 million last year,” Cordonnier said. “That’s down about 26 million tons from last year, which is a significant drop. The news is better for the South American corn crop, which I have at 167 million tons, compared to last year’s harvest of 143 million.

“That’s up a good amount from last year,” he added. “That jump happened because the Safriña corn crop was such a disaster in 2021. Corn will be better than last year, and soybeans will be worse than last year: It’s the reverse of what we had last year in South America.”

Does that mean some soybean export opportunities for the U.S. this year? It’s likely, but Cordonnier says the war in Ukraine and its impact on global commodity markets makes it hard to know for sure what’s ahead for the remainder of 2022.

August 23, 2019August 23, 2019

Fillmore Central football upgrade: Sports Podcast

Here’s the latest Chad Smith Media podcast with the full interview from Mensink. It’s downloadable. Just click on the three buttons stacked on the right side and hit download.

Fillmore Central football fans will find things look a lot different when they head out to the home field in Harmony for the season opener on Friday, August 30^th, against United South Central. After a couple of years of plans and discussions, as well as several months of hard work, the football facility upgrades all but completed. Falcons’ head coach (and Athletic Director) Chris Mensink said the upgrade idea got started because of very little room on the home sideline.

Falcons didn’t have enough room

“Our home sideline was right on a hillside,” he said, “which meant there were some safety issues. We talked initially about sliding the field away from the hill but were limited because we host junior high baseball on that same field. The question was how do we do that slide things over?

“We ended up moving the baseball field up behind the community center where we practice football,” he said. “The school owns all that practice area up there. Once we found a new place to put the baseball field, that kickstarted the process of putting a football-only facility together.”

He said sliding the field to give the team more room on the sideline, as well as adding in a 500-seat grandstand, eventually led to a larger-scale renovation process. Eventually, the project included new lights, crowning the field, and putting in a new watering system. “We’re now building a structure to hold the concession stand, a ticket area, some new bathrooms, and a locker room for the referees,” he said.

Mensink said the Falcons the kids were “basically standing on a hillside and couldn’t have any benches on their sideline.” Back when the district built the press box, they added a bunch of fill to the area so the fans could see over the top of the kids standing on the sideline.

Safety concerns

“That made the sideline really tight to the hill,” Mensink said. “If we had a player get injured, he wouldn’t be able to sit on a bench along the sideline because of that hill. If they tried to sit on a table so the trainer could look them over, the tables would tip over.

“Also, the area where the old concession stand sat was fenced,” he added. “That fence was a little tight to the back corner of the end zone. If a player went too far out of the back of the end zone, they were running into that fence and we don’t want kids getting hurt.”

Workers lay the foundations for the new facilities at the Fillmore Central football field. (Contributed photo)

When a football field doesn’t have a crown on it, that’s when it can get flooded by heavy rainfall. “The soil contained a lot of clay, which made it really hard,” Mensink said. “We were having a hard time keeping grass on it, so the surface wasn’t what it should be. When we took a hard look at the field, we decided to do this right and crown the field.”

Crowning the field

For those who don’t know, crowning a football field is a lot of work. Workers start the project by removing the topsoil from the field. “They brought in a sandy mixture of soil as soon as we were done playing last fall,” Mensink recalled. “You use that sandy soil to build the crown. After that, workers brought in eight inches of black dirt and piled it on top of the sandier soil last spring. They re-graded everything, slid it over to where it needed to be, and that’s when we put the sod down.”

School officials even talked about flipping the field, so it ran north and south instead of east and west. Mensink said that would have involved a lot of extra work, including moving the crow’s next.

Thanks to everyone who helped

He said they wouldn’t be able to make improvements of this magnitude without the support of the administration. “The district has been putting some money away in their building fund,” Mensink said. “The fund balance helped us make a lot of improvements at the football field and helps with ongoing projects at the school building.”

Falcon fans will be sitting on the other sideline this fall. Mensink said officials put in a 500-foot grandstand that will be “nice and close to the action,” and everyone will have a great view of the game. He said the field has a “nice crown on it” and looks “really nice.”

Mensink thanks everyone who helped out. He says the list of everyone who helped with the project is gigantic. “We put sod down with a great deal of volunteer help,” Mensink recalled. “We put down five semi loads of sod in a day, which was an amazing cost-saving for our district.

New seating at the Fillmore Central football field means the fans get a great view of the games. (Contributed Photo)

“Scheevel and Sons Construction handled all of the gradings on this project,” he said. “Stateline Cement did all the cement work for areas underneath the bleachers, for the sidewalks, and the concession areas. Morem’s Electric handled all the electrical work. VIS Plumbing handled all the plumbing work at the facility.”

Fillmore Central fans will get to enjoy the new facility right away as three of the first four games of the fall season will be on the Falcons’ home field.

June 20, 2019June 20, 2019

Flooding Problems Ongoing in Farm Country

Farmers in different parts of rural America are still dealing with flooding. Bryce Anderson, Senior Ag Meteorologist from DTN, says those struggles are continuing in some areas, while other parts of farm country are continuing to show some improvement.

Other parts of the Midwest are still dealing with flood stage and don’t have an immediate end in sight.

The rainfall isn’t over for parts of the country still dealing with saturated soils.

Anderson says the last time farm country had flooding problems that covered such a large area at the same time was back in 1993. He says the wet pattern will likely stick around at least through the end of June and possibly early July…

Bryce Anderson is Senior Ag Meteorologist with DTN.

For some perspective on how bad the flooding has been, an article on the Pacific Standard Magazine website says the Mississippi River has received rain and snow levels at a staggering 200 percent above normal.

And, it’s not just farmers who are suffering because of the flooding. The flooding has wrecked homes, contaminated drinking water, and done billions of dollars in damages. Unfortunately, industry experts are warning that it may take years for agriculture and rural America to recover from the extensive damages.