Russia:  Excessive Heat Places Sunflowers and Corn Under Stress

The USDA August 2006/07 estimate for Russia sunflowerseed production is 6.5 million tons, roughly matching last year's level.  Corn production is estimated at 3.6 million tons, up 0.4 million from last year.  Russia's Southern District, which accounts for roughly 60 percent of the country's sunflowerseed output and 80 to 90 percent of the corn, has been marked by persistent heat during the past two weeks. Temperatures were high in eastern Ukraine as well, which is another key corn and sunflowerseed region.

Daily maximum temperatures routinely exceeded 35 degrees C (95 degrees F) throughout southern Russia, and climbed as high as 42 degrees C (107 degrees F) in Stavropol and Rostov territories.  The heat wave arrived and became established as sunflowers were likely advancing through the seed formation stage, when the crop is especially vulnerable to high temperatures.  Satellite-derived vegetation indices (NDVI) as of August 10 indicate reduced crop vigor in Rostov, Stavropol, and eastern Ukraine compared to last year. 

Russian farmers, encouraged by the continued high profitability of sunflowerseed and its relatively low cost of production, planted 6.1 million hectares of sunflowers for 2006/07, marking the second consecutive year of record planted area.  (Note that the official USDA estimates indicate harvested area, which typically fluctuates between 86 and 98 percent of planted area.)  Sunflower area has increased nearly without interruption since 2001, and the growth in area has been accompanied by a steady increase in yield.  The yield improvements can be attributed in large part to an increase in the use of high-quality -- and chiefly imported -- planting seed.  Between 2001 and 2005, imports of planting seed for sunflowers jumped from less than 1,100 to over 6,100 metric tons.  During the same time, yield increased consistently from 0.8 to 1.2 tons per hectare.  Imported seed is currently used on an estimated 25 to 35 percent of planted area.  At the same time, Russian specialists are working to shorten the vegetation period and improve the disease resistance of native varieties. 

The planted area of soybeans and rape, Russia's two other oilseed crops, increased significantly for 2006/07.  According to SovEcon, an independent commodity analysis group in Moscow, preliminary data from the State Statistical Agency (Rosstat) indicates that soybean area increased by 18 percent to 849,000 hectares.  Rapeseed area exploded to 538,000 hectares, from 244,000 hectares last year.  Winter rape area remained fairly stable, at 80,000 hectares, while spring rape area virtually tripled, from 159,000 to 458,000 hectares.  Spring rape area increased most sharply in territories that suffered heavy winter-grain losses, most notably in the Volga and southern Central Districts. 

Planted corn-for-grain area in Russia increased by nearly 30 percent this year, from 0.87 to 1.11 million hectares.  Harvested area, however, depends in part on summer weather.  In years of severe drought as much as one-third of the planted area can be cut early and harvested as silage.  Farmers typically make this decision -- whether to cut corn for silage or let the crop mature and harvest for grain -- in mid- to late August. 

Current USDA area and production estimates for grains and other agricultural commodities are available on PECAD’s Agricultural Production page, or at PSD Online.