Winter Wheat Harvest Drops Another 2%

WASHINGTON - Jun 12/01 - STAT -- The projected size of this year's winter wheat harvest in the United States keeps falling, with the USDA slashing another 2% from its projections.

In its latest crop report, the USDA pegged winter wheat output at 1.32 billion bushels, a 15% reduction from last year and the smallest harvest since 1978. Based on June 1 conditions, the U.S. yield is forecast at 41.2 bushels per acre, down 0.6 bushels from the last forecast.

Hard Red production is down slightly from a month ago to 717 million bushels. White Winter is down 3% from last month. Soft Red is down 3% from the last forecast and now totals 396 million bushels.

Winter wheat area for 2001 grain harvest is forecast at 32.1 million acres, unchanged from May 1, but down 8% from 2000. This is the smallest winter wheat area since 1957. As of June 3, heading had reached 83% in the 18 major States. Harvest progress was at 3%, ranging from none in most States to 26% in Texas.

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