Source: Oleoscope (Russia)
Sunflower acreage in the United States in 2024 is down 46% from 2023 to 715,200 acres (289,400 hectares), according to the USDA’s first crop report. At 593,900 acres (240,300 hectares), oilseed acreage is 49% lower than in 2023, reports Farmprogress.
Non-oilseed acreage is estimated at 121,200 acres (49,047 hectares), down 21% from the previous year. US sunflower production for 2024 has not yet been determined and will not be known until later this year. Most of the sunflower crop has been rated “good” to “excellent” throughout the growing season. Yields are expected to be above normal if the weather is favorable for harvesting for the remainder of the fall. Initial estimates of total sunflower production are between 1.2 and 1.4 billion pounds, about 38% below last year’s crop.
The USDA will release final acreage and production estimates in January of this year.
Depending on the size of the 2024 crop, seed prices could fall as crop shipments arrive at the mills and farmers accelerate their sales over the next few months. After the first crop delivery, prices will follow demand news.
The market also continues to monitor developments in the Black Sea region. Extreme drought conditions have affected sunflower production. Analyst firm Oil World (Germany) recently lowered its production estimates for Russia to 17.1 million tons and for Ukraine to 13.4 million tons, compared to last year’s production of 18.4 million tons in Russia and 14.9 million tons in Ukraine. Oil World (Germany) also lowered the production outlook for Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey.
The European agency MARS also lowered its forecasts for average sunflower yields in the EU below the five-year average to 19.8 quintals/hectare due to unfavorable conditions in southern and eastern Europe.
While the harvest is underway in the northern hemisphere, the market is beginning to look at the prospects for production in the southern hemisphere in 2025. Farmers in Brazil and Argentina are talking about expanding soybean acreage in 2025, which could put pressure on new crop oilseed prices in the US this fall and winter.
US producers expect oil extraction facilities to offer contracts for new crops with high oleic acid content, so new crop sunflower prices should be competitive with other crops. Sunflower oil premiums are offered by oil extraction plants at a rate of 2% for every 1% of oil content above 40%. An oil content of 45% in the seed, for example, results in a 10% premium on the price, further increasing the gross profit from sunflowers.
The current USDA estimate for 2024/25 assumes a global sunflower seed production of 50.6 million tons, which is significantly lower than the last estimate from August (52.5 million tons). This would be the smallest harvest in four years. This means that the global supply of sunflowers will be reduced by 5.3 million tons compared to the previous year.