US Soybeans Farmers Produce Record Crop in 2021

U.S. soybean farmers made history in 2021, according to the latest round of reports from the Department of Agriculture.

Earlier this month, USDA released the January World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates report. Mac Marshall, United Soybean Board and U.S. Soybean Export Council Vice President of Market Intelligence, says the biggest takeaway from the latest USDA report is that it confirms the 2021 soybean crop as a record.

“The importance of that can’t be overstated when you look back to a lot of the heat and dryness pressure that much of the soybean growing regions of this country felt over the summer. So to come through that with a near record yield and total record production, I think it’s pretty substantial. Of course, at this time of year all eyes are on South America.”

With two consecutive years of La Niña conditions, Marshall says USDA made cuts to soybean production across Paraguay, Argentina and Brazil.

“Brazil getting dropped by five million tons from 144 in the December estimate to 139 million metric tons In January, still a record, so it’s not like this is a small crop that’s going to be coming out of South America, but it is a notable cut. And that of course does impact the global balance sheets where we saw reduction in projected ending stocks by seven million tons.”

Marshall adds farmers are heading into a good price environment in 2022, thanks in part to longstanding efforts to create and expand markets by the soybean checkoff.

“A lot of farmers are trying to exercise creative strategies to mitigate the significant run-up that we’ve seen in input costs. So, that’s certainly factoring in I think more acutely than we’ve seen in other years. But keeping it on the revenue side, it’s certainly a good price environment overall.”

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