Brazil’s Paraná state finalizes soybean harvest, sees worse quality in 2nd corn crop

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Paraná, Brazil’s second-largest grain and oilseed producer after Mato Grosso, has finished harvesting soybeans for the 2020/21 season, while registering a worsening in the quality of the second corn crop in the face of dry weather, the Department of Rural Economics (Deral) pointed out Tuesday.

Until the previous week, Paraná had harvested 98% of the soybean area and planted 99% of the second corn crop.

Now 100% of the oilseed fields have already been harvested in the state, which still has 1% of the projected area with the winter cereal to be planted, according to the Paraná Agriculture Department.

With drier weather since the end of March, something that should continue for most of this week, Paraná continues to see a deterioration in the quality of the “safrinha” (second corn crop).

In the weekly comparison, the agency linked to the state government reduced the percentage of areas classified as good from 76% to 62%.

The areas in average conditions, in turn, went from 21% to 31%, while the crops considered bad with a chance of loss went from 3% to the current 7%.

The harvest of summer corn reached 95%, compared to 92% in the previous week.

The second corn crop in Paraná is estimated at 13.38 million tons, according to Deral’s March forecast, against 13.55 million in February’s forecast and 11.9 million in the previous cycle, according to the department.

Paraná’s 2020/21 soybean crop was estimated at 20.09 million tons, versus 20.78 million tons in 2019/20.