Minnesota farmers intend to plant 8.40 million acres of corn for all purposes in 2020 according to the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service’s Prospective Plantings report issued March 31.

This is 600,000 acres above last year.

Farmers in Minnesota intend to plant 7.40 million acres of soybeans, up 8% from 2019. Spring wheat producers intend to plant 1.35 million acres, down 100,000 acres from last year.

Other projected plantings for 2020, based on farmer surveys, include:

Minnesota farmers intend to harvest 1.15 million acres of all hay in 2020, up 5% from last year.

The Prospective Plantings report provides the first official, survey-based estimates of U.S. farmers’ 2020 planting intentions. NASS’s acreage estimates are based primarily on surveys conducted during the first two weeks of March from a sample of approximately 80,000 farm operators across the U.S. More than 3,200 farmers in Minnesota responded to the survey.

Actual plantings will depend upon weather, economic conditions and the availability of production inputs at the time producers make their final planting decisions.

Nationwide, prospective planting of corn in 2020 is estimated at 97 million acres, up 8% or 7.29 million acres from last year. Compared with last year, planted acreage is expected to be up or unchanged in 38 of the 48 estimating states.

The soybean planted area for 2020 is estimated at 83.5 million acres, up 10% from last year. Compared with last year, planted acreage is expected to be up or unchanged in 22 of the 29 estimating states.

All wheat planted area for 2020 is estimated at 44.7 million acres, down 1% from 2019. This represents the lowest all wheat planted area since records began in 1919.

The 2020 winter wheat planted area, at 30.8 million acres, is down 1% from last year and down slightly from the previous estimate. Of this total, about 21.7 million acres are hard red winter wheat, 5.69 million acres are soft red winter wheat and 3.42 million acres are white winter wheat.

Area expected to be planted to other spring wheat for 2020 is estimated at 12.6 million acres, down 1% from 2019. Of this total, about 11.9 million acres are hard red spring wheat. Durum-planted area for 2020 is expected to total 1.29 million acres, down 4% from the previous year.

Source: USDA-NASS Minnesota Field Office, which is solely responsible for the information provided and is wholly owned by the source. Informa Business Media and all of its subsidiaries are not responsible for any of the content contained in this information asset.