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Currently the global focus, when it comes to wheat, is Argentina. World Ag Outlook Board Chair Mark Jekanowski said harvest in the South American country is nearly complete at this point. When farmers were planting this year’s crop, they were struggling with dry conditions.

“But they got some beneficial rains late in the season, just ahead of harvest, in November and December, and the crop turned around and came out pretty good.  So we increased our production forecast for Argentina wheat by 500,000 tons to what will be a record wheat production in Argentina of 20.5 million tons.”

Jekanowski added Argentina wasn’t the only location where the USDA had to adjust their numbers.

“In terms of global production we made a small upward adjustment in the EU, based on Admin data from France, so a little bit higher production there, but by and large, the big story this year globally for wheat production is in Argentina where that crop came out better than a lot of folks had anticipated early on.”

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