Sowing Progress

By Georgia Campbell

3^rd June, 2024

Sowing is steadily progressing across the country, although conditions vary widely from north to south and east to west. Rainfalls across Australia have varied significantly, across northern Western Australia with 10-30mm reported, while southern Western Australia receiving a lesser amount. 

Across NSW, northern NSW received good rainfall of between 20-70mm and Victoria received varied rainfall between 5 & 50mm. Unfortunately, the western cropping area have yet to falls that are insufficient to provide much subsoil moisture for sustaining crops through their growing phases. While the canola window has now shut for Western Australia and Victoria, the rainfall will hopefully provide some surety that a winter crop will be achievable. The latest long range weather forecast released by the Bureau of Meteorology at the end of May is optimistic, suggesting no strong signal towards above or below average rainfall for the winter months for most of Australia.

In central New South Wales, sowing is considered largely complete, with all canola now in the ground and a high percentage of the wheat and barley sown. Growers in northern New South Wales and Queensland are slightly further behind, with summer sorghum and cotton crops prioritised for harvest, particularly where some growers will turn around and look to double-crop summer crop areas back into later winter crop varieties. 

Looking at markets, concerns about Australian rainfall totals across some winter cropping regions has continued to drive Australian markets, coupled with concerns about production in the USA and Russia. Rainfall received for the start of June and potential rainfall for the first week, will alleviate some of this concern across all crops. Production prospects in the USA have also improved, while Russian crop prospects continue to be on the lower side moving into the harvest window, noting a small Russian crop is still in the range of 70 to 80 million tonnes for wheat alone. The canola market continues to move around, driven by movements in soybean and palm oil markets. USA soybean planting continues at pace, while spring canola is also being planted across Canada. 

Sorghum harvest keeps progressing for Queensland and Northern NSW. While there had initially been concerns around quality following heavy rainfall received over the last 2 months, the crops continue to prove their resilience, with quality continuing to average SOR1. High moisture continues to be an issue, with plenty of the crop requiring drying prior to delivery. It’s estimated in Queensland that harvest is approximately 50% complete and in Northern New South Wales 70-75% complete.