South Africa Bean Interest Expands

VANCOUVER - Oct 23/08 - SNS -- Dry edible bean production in South Africa stands a good chance of rebounding this season if the country's farmer stick with the intention to boost seeded area.

Seeding intentions estimates for the 2008-09 summer crop from the South African Grain Information Service (SAGIS) suggest bean area could jump from 43,800 to 54,000 hectares this season. If yields are at their recent five-year average of 1,239 kilograms per hectare, output would advance from 58,795 to 66,900 MT.

SAGIS also updated its winter crop estimates, but it no longer tries to estimate lupin production in the country, reflecting the small size of the crop and the limited number of growers and processors involved with the crop.

The prospective increase in dry edible bean seedings is part of a general shift away from corn. Land in that crop is expected to drop 8.5% to 2.562 million hectares. SAGIS said, "The figures show that producers intend to plant 1.600 million hectares for white maize, which is 137,000 hectares (7.9%) less than in the previous season. In the case of yellow maize, the expected plantings is 962,000 hectares, which is 100,000 hectares (9.4%) less than in the previous season.

"These figures give an indication of the intentions of commercial farmers to plant summer crops as at the middle of October 2008. Farmers indicated that the main reasons for the decrease in area planted to maize are that they have to weigh up the availability of credit and the cost of finance, higher input costs and the current lower international maize prices. Over and above these reasons, the weather is also a decisive factor that will influence farmers’ decisions to plant summer grain crops.

"In the case of sunflower seed the expected plantings increased by 3.9%, compared to the previous season. The plantings of soybeans, groundnuts, sorghum and dry beans also show increases of 37.5%, 6.1%, 9.3% and 23.3%, respectively."

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