Forecaster: Winter weather expected to return to Illinois soon
While most meteorologists are calling for continued mild conditions for Illinois, one forecaster is warning about a wet spring for 2012.
Dan Grant
Published: Jan 27, 2012
Editor's note: FarmWeekNow's Dan Grant spoke with Mike McCellan of Mobile Weather Team about what to expect in the coming weeks both in South America and here in Illinois.
Recent rains offered brief relief in parched areas of South America, particularly southern Brazil and Argentina, but it wasn’t enough to end concerns about short crops.
USDA earlier this month projected average soybean yields this year compared to last year would decline by 4.4 bushels per acre in Paraguay, 4 bushels in Brazil, and three-tenths of a bushel in Argentina.
Meanwhile, USDA this month trimmed Argentina’s corn production by 3 million metric tons (118 million bushels) and many traders believe final yields will be even lower.
“In Argentina, production is centrally located and that’s where it’s been the hottest and driest,” said Bryce Stremming, market analyst with MID-CO Commodities, during MID-CO’s 32nd annual winter outlook meeting in Bloomington. “They’re going to have some (production) problems.”
Mike McClellan, meteorologist and owner of Mobile Weather Team in Washington who was the keynote speaker at the MID-CO meeting, said recent rains were widely scattered in Argentina.
And he predicted the hot/dry pattern will continue there next month.
“The problem is the fronts (that have passed over Argentina) have not been very well organized,” McClellan said. “Almost all of the farming area (in Central Argentina) is dry. And I suspect that, overall, the dry weather pattern will continue in South America.”
The northern two-thirds of Brazil, on the other hand, has received sufficient rainfall for crop production. But many traders doubt production there will be enough to offset crop losses to the south.
“If we do see a drop in production in Argentina, we may see (U.S.) exports pick up a bit,” Stremming said.
Elsewhere, a severe drought in Mexico, which seems to be getting less media attention than the South American situation, also could have a significant impact on the markets.
The current outlook for spring-summer grain harvests in Mexico is for significant damage to production.
“Logically, if there’s no water in the dams, there won’t be corn,” Jose Luis Luege, managing director of Mexico’s national water commission, said during a telephone interview with the media. “We’re going to need to import more grains from the U.S.”
Last year, Mexico lost a reported 1.2 million hectares (2.88 million acres) of crops and about 50,000 head of livestock to the ongoing drought, which also had a similar impact in the Southern U.S., including much of Texas.
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