Big Rebounds in Store for Spring Wheat, Canola Output

This year’s Canadian spring wheat harvest could be the largest in nine years, while canola output may match the fourth highest ever, the results of a recent crop tour show. 

Argus Media and Winnipeg-based LeftField Commodity Research partnered on the two-pronged tour, which covered a combined more than 4,000 km of Prairie farmland over a five-day period earlier this month. Based on a mix of random field sampling and input from producers along the way, the results of the tour were discussed in an Argus-sponsored webinar Thursday. 

Maxence Devillers, a grain analyst with Argus Media, pegged this year’s average spring wheat at 53.2 bu/acre, up almost 17 bu or 46% from last year’s drought-ravaged result. Using Statistics Canada’s latest planted area estimates, that translates to a crop of just over 26 million tonnes - an increase of approximately 10 million tonnes from a year earlier and potentially the largest spring wheat crop since producers reaped 27.2 million tonnes in 2013.