France’s agriculture ministry lowers sunflower, wheat area estimates

Sunflower: The initial forecast is for 2025 plantings to be 674,000 hectares, down 10.7% from 2024 and the third consecutive annual decline.

For rapeseed, France’s main oilseed, the ministry’s estimate was raised slightly to 1.3 million hectares from 1.29 million last month, though that’s still down 2.3% from a year earlier.

France’s agriculture ministry on Tuesday lowered its soft wheat area estimate for the 2025 crop, but still expects a sharp rebound in plantings from last year, when rains hit the area.

The ministry’s crop report put the soft wheat area at 4.60 million hectares, down from 4.63 million hectares estimated in April but still up 9.1% from last year.

France, the European Union’s top grain producer, had its smallest wheat harvest since the 1980s last year after heavy rains and lack of sunshine disrupted planting and hampered plant development.

In addition to the increased planting area, yield estimates from agricultural bureau FranceAgriMer suggest that wheat crops are in better condition than last year, supporting expectations for a sharp rebound in production this summer.

In its first estimate of maize area this year, the ministry put the total area, including maize for seed, at 1.48 million hectares, down 7.6% from 2024.

Corn acreage was expected to fall this year due to increased wheat plantings last fall.

The ministry slightly raised its estimate of French sugar beet acreage for this year’s harvest to 393,000 hectares, up from last month’s estimate of 391,000 hectares but still 4.6% below last year.

Tags: France, wheat, sunseed, sown area