Post forecasts that the total area planted to corn later in 2013 by commercial and subsistence farmers for the 2013/14 MY [1] (May 2014 to April 2015), will be around 3.1 million hectares.
Commercial farmers will plant about 2.6 million hectares and subsistence farmers 500,000 hectares.
This forecast is based on the decreasing trend in hectares planted with corn over the past 10 years in South Africa. Based on national average yields, 3.1 million hectares could realize a total corn crop of about 12.2 million tons and an exportable surplus of two million tons.
The Crop Estimates Committee (CEC) in June estimated the commercial corn crop for the 2012/13 MY at 11.4 million tons, which is already one million tons or eight percent lower than its first estimate in February.
The area planted was kept unchanged at 2.8 million hectares. The drought that hit the Northwest and Free State Provinces earlier this year, severely affected the summer crops.
Expectations are that the CEC will decrease its production estimate for commercial corn even more by the end of July. Hence, post kept its commercial corn crop estimate unchanged at 11.1 million tons.
According to the CEC, subsistence farmers produced 675,090 tons of corn on 456,900 hectares in the 2012/13 MY. This means that South Africa’s total corn crop for the 2012/13 MY is estimated at 11.8 million tons on 3.2 million hectares.
In the first three months of the 2012/13 MY, South Africa already exported 701,818 tons of corn. Post estimates that South Africa will export around 1.9 million tons of corn in the 2012/13MY. The 2011/12 MY’s corn exports were finalized at 1.8 million tons.
