Fewer Crop Acres in Years Ahead Because of Chronically Low Farmgate Prices- USDA

Dec 23, 2014

Farmers will scale back plantings of the eight major field crops by nearly 5 percent - a total of 12.3 million acres - over the next five years in response to sustained, lower commodity prices, projects the Agriculture Department. The biggest cutbacks would be in wheat, down 8 percent, and soybeans, down 7 percent, from this year's levels. Corn, the most widely grown crop in the nation, would drop by 1.5 percent.

With lower market prices, farmers will take less-productive land out of crop and shift higher-yielding land into crops with the best potential for profit. The 258.5 million acres of corn, soybeans, wheat, sorghum, barley, oats, rice and upland cotton planted for harvest this year would contract to an eight-crop total of 246.2 million acres in 2019. Nonetheless, hefty corn, wheat and soybean supplies are expected.

USDA released its long-term "baseline" projections this week- ahead of its annual Outlook Forum, to be held on Feb 19 and 20. The projections reflect conditions in mid-November. USDA will release later its projections of farm income, food inflation and international crop developments. It has forecast a 21 percent drop in net farm income this year because of a large decline in crop revenue, offset somewhat by sky-high cattle, hog, poultry and dairy prices.

Corn, soybeans and wheat fetched record prices following the drought-shortened 2012 harvest - $6.89 a bushel for corn, $14.40 for soybeans and $7.77 for wheat. They slid downhill as a result of bumper crops in 2013 and this year.

For wheat and soybeans, the skid is expected to continue. Soybeans, second in plantings to corn, are projected to sell at the farm gate for $8.50-$9.20 per bushel over the next five years, compared to the season-average $10 forecast for this year's record-large crop. Wheat, forecast for an average $6 this marketing year, would bottom out at $4.65 in 2016/17 and recover to $4.85 in 2019/20.

By comparison, corn prices, like projected plantings, would be stable at roughly $3.50 a bushel for the five-year period. The average price would drop to $3.40 a bushel for the 2015 crop, USDA said, following two record-setting crops in a row.

Sowings of upland cotton would drop by 900,000 acres, or 8 percent, during the five-year period and rice would hold steady at 3 million acres.

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Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.