October 7, 2013
Uruguay''s 2012-13 soy acreage up 20%
The latest survey from Uruguay''s Ministry of Agriculture and Livestock revealed that the country''s latest soy crop was the highest in history, at 2.76 million tonnes and a 20% increase in the acreage which has reached to 1,049,000 hectares.
But the most outstanding record was in yields at 2,634 kilogrammes per hectare, a significant increase over the previous crop with 2,390 kilogrammes and from the on-going average in the range of 2,000 kilogrammes per hectare.
Government and farmers agreed that the unsatisfactory yields was one of the barriers to keep increasing land planted with soy but this last crop has swept aside the forecast. In effect the surge in area and yield helped with the largest crop in history at 2,764,000 tonnes of soy.
Agronomist Fernando Rincon from the Ministry''s Agriculture Stats office, DIEA, said that the high yield of the second harvest of 2,437 kilogrammes per hectare compared to the 2,788 kilogrammes of the first harvest was crucial since "the difference is usually much greater".
For this coming crop Rincon estimates that the area planted will have a floor of 950,000 hectares, although the definitive figure should be greater. For the last crop DIEA had estimated 883,700 hectares but finally it was 950,000 hectares.
The report also showed that in the last 10 years, corn managed to be the second highest yield with 5,648 kilogrammes per hectare. The area planted was 121,500 hectares and the harvest reached 692,600 tonnes. Regarding sorghum the crop was down 56% compared to 2011-12 with not much difference in the yields. The area planted for this last crop was 48,500 hectares with an average yield of 4,262 tonnes per hectare and a total production of 208,900 tonnes.