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2021 planting acreage comes down to prevent plant

While market strength might suggest an increase in soybean acres next year, at least one economist says not so fast.

David Widmar with Agricultural Economic Insights tells Brownfield at the end of the day, what’s best varies from farm to farm.

“Just because the market is saying plant more soybeans, doesn’t mean that’s the right decision for every field on every producers farm,” Widmar said.

He said next year’s planting acreage comes down to prevent plant.

“It’s sort of like flipping a coin, right,” Widmar said. “Well, we flipped a coin in 2019 and had huge prevent plant [acres], kind of record breaking for recent memory and we did it again here in 2020 with the second highest level that we’ve seen in the last 10, 15 years.”

Widmar said because the price ratio is strong for soybeans, planting levels will work back up to where they were before the trade war and closer to corn.