Argentina’s drought-stricken crops could bring in 23% fewer export dollars this season versus a year earlier, the Buenos Aires grains exchange said in a report on Tuesday. For much of the last year, Argentina’s worst drought in sixty years has delayed planting and withered crop outlooks, making life ever harder for farmers in a country where inflation nears 100%. The agriculture sector’s export revenues from the 2022/2023 harvest are expected to fall to $33.39 billion, the exchange said. The grains exchange forecasts 2022/23 soybean and corn production, crops whose harvest begins in April, at 38 million tonnes and 44.5 million tonnes respectively. As recently as September, the exchange had forecast the soybean crop at 48 million tonnes and corn at 50 million tonnes, a sign of the drought’s toll.

Source: Bueno Aires Herald February 15, 2023 20:25 UTC