Argentina: Barley planting begins in Argentina, with crop forecast up 0.1 mln tonnes thanks to further rainfall

South American barley production regions have received further rainfall over the past two weeks, excessively in parts of Uruguay and Brazil, RMI Analytics said in their latest report.

Barley planting in Argentina has begun (5% complete) with good moisture from the rains, and the weather forecast is to clear, allowing progress to accelerate.

For Argentina, RMI Analytics’ barley crop forecast is increased by 0.1 mln tonnes to the upper range of yield potential, at 4.8 mln tonnes.

Farmers are focused on soybean harvest and therefore barley selling is limited. Export licence declarations are only up slightly with 2.7 mln tonnes declared (approximately 1.85 mln tonnes of feed and about 0.85 mln tonnes of malting barley).

Argentina holds a long-term about 3% share of total global barley supply, but with a high proportion of malting barley varieties seeded the country’s importance in malt is much higher globally.