Nogger's Blog

10/03/11 -- Defra say that UK growers planted just under 700,000 hectares of winter rapeseed for the 2011 harvest, an increase of 72,000 ha or 11.5% on the previous year.

That's a record area which would produce a record crop of close to 2.5 MMT if we were to match last year's yields.

Almost half of that increased area looks like it's come from winter barley where plantings are down 7.5% to 310,000 ha. Winter oats area is seen down 17% to 78,000 ha.

Winter wheat plantings are seen virtually unchanged, despite soaring prices, at 1.937 million hectares.