U.S. farmers to ramp up corn acreage despite supply glut -USDA
U.S. farmers plan to boost their corn seedings by 6.4 percent in 2016 and dial back soy plantings even as supplies of the yellow grain rose sharply from a year ago, the U.S. Agriculture Department said on Thursday.We'll be back with more.
Corn acreage was seen at a bigger-than-expected 93.601 million, which would be the third-highest level since 1944, in the government's closely watched prospective plantings report. USDA also said corn stocks as of March 1 stood at 7.808 billion bushels, the second most on record and up from 7.750 billion bushels a year earlier.
The corn acreage outlook topped analysts' expectations, which ranged from 89.000 million to 91.000 million, with an average of 89.972 million, according to a Reuters poll. In 2015, U.S. farmers seeded 87.999 million acres of corn.
Analysts on average had expected corn stocks of 7.801 billion bushels.
The supply glut has weighed on corn prices and is already threatening the profitability of the crop that U.S. farmers have just begun to plant.
USDA said farmers planned to seed 82.236 million acres of soybeans, which would be the third-highest recorded. That compares with 82.650 million a year ago and an average analyst estimate of 83.057 million....MORE
UPDATE: "USDA Corn Reports: This Ain't Rock and Roll, This Is Genocide"
