Frost and Dry Conditions Reduce Australian Winter Crop Forecasts

ABARES’ Australian Winter crop production forecast released at the beginning of September has been superseded already. Frosting and the continuation of dry conditions in Australia’s Southeastern cropping region and the need for further in-crop moisture for Southern crops in WA, has most in the industry expecting total production to come back from these estimates.

As reported last month; with a turnaround in cropping fortunes in Western Australia over July/August, the continuation of good conditions in Queensland, New South Wales and the majority of Victoria; at the start of September ABARES had the nation’s barley crop at 12.2mmt and total winter crop at 55.2mmt, despite borderline conditions in South Australia.

Since then, two key forecasting bodies in WA and SA have released their own reports on the 20th September noting meagre Spring rains are limiting crop potential in each State, even before the latest frosting event. The collation of these

estimates and revisions of the numbers in Victoria and the Riverina has the Barley crop production back to 10.9mmt, which is still higher than the 10 year average but lower compared to the last 5 years for both feed and malting barley.

Although this gives a useful early crop estimation post frosting, next month, the early harvest results in Qld/NNSW, a greater understanding of the frost damage and results from Victoria’s GIAV crop survey will provide more certainty about how big Australia’s 24/25 crop is likely to be.