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Conflicting reports on seed corn shortage

There have been conflicting reports this week on whether a shortage of seed corn could affect farmers’ planting intentions this spring.

The Wall Street Journal says an estimated 25 to 50 percent drop in 2011 U.S. seed corn production could create problems for farmers who are planning to plant more acres to corn in 2012.

However, officials of both Monsanto and Pioneer say their seed supplies will be adequate to meet the increased demand. 

Monsanto CEO Hugh Grant was asked about seed supply during the company’s R & D pipeline update on Thursday. “We feel good about our own position and we are ready, willing and able to supply our farmer-customers,” Grant said, “so we’re in pretty good shape.”  

USDA chief economist Joe Glauber tells Bloomberg News while some of the more popular varieties may not be available, there is no evidence to suggest that planted acres will be constrained by a shortage of seed.

Bill Tierney, chief economist with Chicago-based AgResource agrees.  He says while some farmers won’t be able to buy their first choice, there would be no statistically significant impact on corn seedings or on corn yields.

Brownfield’s Dave Russell contributed to this story.

  • Very interesting article about Corn Seed Shortage…

    However; there is still light at the end of the tunnel…Most people or farmers don’t know of other good alternatives to field corn or soybeans. I am talking about those known as specialty crops like “Popcorn”. Most popcorn is grown under contract to processors. This acreage is adjusted an-nually to the processors’ estimated needs as determined by market analysis. Most contracts specify that a grower plant a certain number of acres with a certain hybrid for a certain price per 100 pounds of popcorn delivered. As an alternative to firm pricing, some processors write contracts using the commodity price of corn on the Board of Trade on a given day, thus allowing the grower some flexibility in the system. By keeping abreast of popcorn supply and demand as well as the price of dent corn and soybeans, processors are able, under normal conditions, to contract popcorn at prices that provide a reasonable profit for the successful grower. Hence, growing contracted popcorn should be competitive with growing dent corn. Some well known Popcorn-Processors just to name a few are.- ConAgra Foods (ActII & Orville Redenbacher’s Brands), American Popcorn (Jolly Time Brand), Snappy Popcorn, etc. It will be nice to write something about it as an option or alternative to farmers other than Field Corn or Soybeans in order to consider Popcorn as an other profitable crop. You can find more information from these websites…

    http://corn.agronomy.wisc.edu/Management/pdfs/NCH05_CR-2104web.pdf

    http://www.nal.usda.gov/speccoll/images1/popcorn.html

    http://www.popcorn.org/

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