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Record hottest year means record bumper wheat crop, opposite of crop models

Last year there were warnings from crop modelers in Nature that heat kills wheat and yields were going to fall in the “near future”, if temperatures rose. In fact global warming was “already slowing wheat gains”. What followed was a record El Nino, and 2015 was the hottest ever year, with 2016 vying to beat it. But instead of wheat doom, this month the USDA forecasts a record yield of wheat with bumper crops globally. Wheat output has grown in Australia, the US, Russia, Ukraine, everywhere pretty much, except the EU where it has been too rainy. Where are the mea culpas?    h/t to the GWPF

Jan 2015, published in Nature“Global Wheat Yield May Drop as Temperatures Rise”

“… researchers are now letting farmers know that the world’s wheat yields are excepted decline in the near future, with the world standing to lose six percent of its wheat crop for every degree Celsius that the annual global temperature increases.

“The simulations with the multi-crop models showed that warming is already slowing yield gains, despite observed yield increases in the past, at a majority of wheat-growing locations across the globe,” researcher Senthold Asseng, at the University of Florida, explained in a statement.”

August 2016: USDA projects 743m ton wheat production from 2016/2017 year

USDA current August forecast is for 743 million tons, up from 734 million last year (estimated).

Looks like yet another global warming disaster:

Global Wheat Production, Forecast, 2016/2017 year. USDA. Graph.

Source: Food Security Portal with last blue bar added by me for recent USDA estimate.

 

September 2016: Climate chicken Littles Choke on Record Wheat Crop

Extensive planting and benign weather have forced analysts to repeatedly raise crop outlooks. The International Grains Council last week increased its global wheat production forecast to a record 743m tonnes, up 1 per cent from last year

The recent US winter wheat harvest was 45m tonnes, up 21 per cent from 2015, according to the US Department of Agriculture. Merchants who have run out of room in silos are piling wheat outdoors.

Storage concerns are also growing in Russia, which is this year set to become the largest wheat exporter after hauling in more than 70m tonnes. In Canada, the government anticipates the second-largest wheat crop in 25 years, of 30.5m tonnes. Australia’s imminent wheat harvest is forecast at 26.5m tonnes, the most in five years.

Defying not only the Club of Rome doomsayers, but also the climate Chicken Littles who have been warning about damage from rising temperatures to world agriculture, food production is booming even as meteorologists call July 2016 the hottest month ever. –– Financial Times

Australia may compete with Russia for the title of largest wheat exporter this year if the most optimistic projection below is right. If the climate cools in 2017 or soon after, how likely is it that Russia will be a record wheat exporter?

Sept 2016:  Australia’s wheat crop could be in for dramatic upgrade

Australia’s wheat crop could be in for a dramatic upgrade, potentially to a record high, thanks to wet weather which has put “stellar yields” in prospect – if stoking the quality worries already live in the world market.

Forecaster Lanworth pegged the Australian wheat harvest this year at 24.3m-29.3m tonnes, with a central estimate of 27.2m tonnes, flagging “overall beneficial conditions during the growing season”.

Indeed, satellite imagery shows “record vegetation density… across nearly all major growing regions”, the analysis group said, adding that Australia was “on track for stellar yields” in wheat.

However, even Lanworth could be significantly underestimating crop potential, according to the Australian arm of crop trader Nidera – which says a record harvest could be on the agenda.

“The largest domestic wheat crop 29.6m tonnes was recorded in 2011-12 and at this point in time it is hard to see this year’s crop being under 30m tonnes,” said Peter McMeekin, origination manager at Nidera Australia.

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