Reuters
Brazil Mato Grosso soy area says lost 12 pct crop
Wednesday February 25, 4:28 pm ET
SAO PAULO, Brazil, Feb 25 (Reuters) - Sorriso district, a major soybean area of north-central Mato Grosso, has lost 12 percent of its crop due to recent heavy rains, the municipality agriculture secretary said on Wednesday.
Last week the government cut its production forecast for Mato Grosso, Brazil's No. 1 soy producer, to 15.02 million tonnes, from 15.64 million.
Around 600,000 hectares (1.5 million acres) of soybeans were planted in Sorriso for the 2003/04 harvest. The crop included 30 percent early maturing varieties of which about half have been harvested.
Longer cycle soybeans were also damaged by wet weather.
"The situation is very difficult due to excessive rain," said Sorriso's Agriculture Secretary Renaldo Loffi. "Where farmers were able to harvest, the soybeans had a very high moisture content of 20 percent."
A lot of early cycle soybeans rotted in the fields due to the heavy rain, he added. The rain has also encouraged the emergence of Asian soy rust and other fungal diseases.
"The number of disease outbreaks is great and it's very difficult to control," said Loffi, adding that spraying soybean plants was ineffective because the fungicide was washed away by the rain.
In Sapezal, another major soybean area in center-west Mato Grosso, the local agriculture secretary said that estimated average yield had been cut to 52 60-kg bags per hectare, from 55 bags. Sapezal has 320,000 hectares of soybeans.
But hot sunshine on Wednesday allowed farmers to harvest.
"Producers suffered varying losses because rainfall was patchy, though heavy," said Sapezal's agriculture secretary Decrecio Teodoro Correia. "Some lost 40 percent, others 10 percent."
In Sorriso and Sapezal, the mostly unpaved roads were unusable due to the rain. As a result it was very difficult to deliver soybeans to crushing plants and ports. |
