Stats Canada says wheat and soybean production up; corn production down

Dec 06, 2016

November Farm Survey of crop production polled about 26,500 farmers

By Diego Flammini
Assistant Editor, North American Content
Farms.com

According to new information released by Statistics Canada, farmers are reporting increased production of wheat, canola, soybean, barley and lentils in 2016, while corn for grain and oat production is down compared to 2015.

The November Farm Survey of crop production asked 26,500 farmers to report their estimated seeded and harvested areas, yield and production of grains, oilseeds and special crops.

Wheat
Total wheat production across Canada is expected to jump by 15 per cent from 2015 to 31.7 million tonnes, marking the second time in five years Canadian wheat farmers produced more than 30 million tonnes.

Farmers experienced a higher average yield of 53.2 bushels per acre in 2016 compared to 42.8 bushels per acre in 2015. A jump of 24.3 per cent.

Harvested wheat acres fell by 7.3 per cent to 21.9 million acres, the lowest in five years.

Province	Production	Change (%)	Average Yield
Alberta	9.9 million tonnes	19.4	58.0 bushels per acre
Saskatchewan	14.5 million tonnes	11.5	47.3 bushels per acre
Manitoba	4.2 million tonnes	0	N/A
Ontario	2.5 million tonnes	15.9	90.9 bushels per acre

Canola
Canola farmers estimate 18.4 million tonnes of canola will be produced in 2016, virtually the same as the year before. Despite a 6.6 per cent decline in harvested acres to 19.2 million, an average yield of 42.3 bushels per acre helped keep production high.

Province	Production	Change (%)	Average Yield
Saskatchewan	9.7 million tonnes	2.3	41.2 bushels per acre
Alberta	5.8 million tonnes	-1.2	46.4 bushels per acre
Manitoba	2.7 million tonnes	-4.0	39.0 bushels per acre

Corn for grain
Production of corn for grain fell 2.7 per cent from 2015 to 13.2 million tonnes. Average yield also fell by 3.6 per cent to 158.7 bushels per acre.

Province	Production	Change (%)	Average Yield
Ontario	8.0 million tonnes	-8.9	158.5 bushels per acre
Quebec	3.8 million tonnes	N/A	168.2 bushels per acre

Soybeans
Farmers reported that 6.5 million tonnes of soybeans will be produced in 2016, up by 1.4 per cent from 2015.

Province	Production	Change (%)	Average Yield
Manitoba	1.8 million tonnes	27.2	41.3 bushels per acre
Ontario	3.4 million tonnes	-9.5	45.9 bushels per acre

Lentils
According to the Stats Canada survey results, lentil production reached a record high of 3.2 million tonnes, up 27.9 per cent from 2015.

Lentil farmers reported a 42.5 per cent increase in harvested area to 5.7 million acres.

Average yield dropped by 10.3 per cent to 1,248 pounds per acre.

Barley and oats
Barley production rose to 8.8 million tonnes in 2016, which Stats Canada says is attributed to a 12.9 per cent increase in average yield to 73.4 bushels per acre – a record high.

Oat farmers reported an 8.2 per cent drop in production from 2015 to 3.1 million tonnes despite a record high yield of 92.3 bushels per acre.

Harvested oat acres also fell 15.1 per cent to 2.2 million acres.

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