Wheat production in Western Australia, the country’s biggest grain-exporting state, is set to fall by 24% this year because of a lack of rain, an industry association said on Friday.

Unfavourable weather will lead to lower per-hectare yield of wheat, as well as barley and canola, the Grain Association of Western Australia (GIWA) said.

But barley and canola output should hold up better because farmers have allocated more land to them and less to wheat.

GIWA’s wheat production forecast of 9.4 million metric tons is well below the five-year average for the state of roughly 11 million tons.

In a monthly crop report, GIWA said recent rain had prevented bigger yield losses.

“The season was slipping away from many but the rainfall has turned around the prospects for reasonable crop yield potentials.”

“However, there are still pockets of country across the grain belt where the rain has been too little, too late, and these areas will struggle no matter what happens from now on,” the report said.

Crops are still at an early stage making any output estimates preliminary and subject to change depending on the weather. The harvest takes place in the final months of the year.
Source: Reuters