Seeding Intentions A Bullish Surprise

VANCOUVER - Apr 23/15 - SNS -- Pulse and specialty crop markets were shocked by Statistics Canada's seeding intentions estimates for this year. Instead of saying they planned to massively increase area, they intend to emphasize grains and reduce area in the category 3.4% to 5.375 million acres.

Farmers say they intend to seed 8% more lentils and just 1% more peas. Both increases fall far short of industry expectations. Markets expected land in lentils to jump at least 16% and land in peas to be up at least 6%.

At the recent CICILS conference in Las Vegas, Canada's pulse trade talked about much bigger increases, saying they expect land in both crops to set new records this year. Instead, if farmers stick with their intentions, this year's seeded area for peas and lentils will be the second largest in history.

It is important to recall that seeding intentions are not the same as seeded area. Seeding intentions are a message from farmers to the market. Actual area reflects the market's response. Significantly, this year's survey of 11,500 farmers across the country took place between March 18 to March 31. Since that time, grower bids have risen significantly in both spot and new crop shipping positions, which would be expected to pull more land into pulses.