US Corn Exports Struggling to Meet USDA’s Already Weak Export Forecast

From 1973-79 corn exports averaged 28% of total usage.

Exports declined in relative importance in succeeding decades averaging 26% of usage in the 1980s and 21% in the 1990s, before dipping below 20% of usage in the first decade of this century.

Corn exports have averaged just 13% of total usage from 2010-2019 but have been more important so far this decade, averaging about 16% of total usage from 2020 through 2022, using USDA’s 2022 export forecast.

Although corn exports provide a smaller contribution to total U.S. corn usage than in prior decades, exports are still an important source of total corn demand and an important demand component that can vary substantially from year-to-year.

USDA’s most recent forecast of corn exports in the 2022 crop marketing year is just 1.85 billion bushels, down 25% from the 2.47 billion bushels exported during the 2021 crop year.

However, that was not the expectation a year ago. USDA provided its first forecast of 2022 crop exports in May 2022 and from May through July USDA was much more optimistic about U.S. corn export prospects.

Last May, USDA forecast that 2.4 billion bushels of the 2022 corn crop would be exported, nearly equal to the prior year’s export total.

Since last summer, however, USDA has been ratcheting down its corn export forecasts, first dipping below a forecast of 2 billion bushels in the January World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report before dropping to the current forecast of 1.85 billion bushels in the March and April WASDE reports.

USDA’s current corn crop export forecast is the second weakest of the last 10 years with only 2019’s total of 1.78 billion bushels falling below this year’s forecast.

Corn exports during the 2020 crop year were a record at 2.75 billion bushels with the 2021 crop year total of 2.47 billion bushels providing the second largest export total on record.

Unfortunately, year-to-date actual corn exports have been below even USDA’s weak export forecast.

Weekly export shipments data provided by USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service during the 2022 crop marketing year through April 27th totaled 999 million bushels, down from 1.576 billion bushels a year earlier.

The year-to-year 37% export decline to date is even larger than USDA’s forecast of a 25% decline in corn exports and is 28% lower than the 5-year corn export average.

Source:michiganfarmnews.com

Photo Credit: GettyImages-art-wager