USDA: Drought Cut Corn Crop by About One-Fourth
January 12th, 2013Via: AP:
For farmers like Earl Williams, last year couldn’t have started out better or ended much worse as a warm, sunny spring that let him plant early gave way to record heat and drought that devastated his corn.
Williams ended up with about two-thirds of the crop he expected, and a U.S. Department of Agriculture report released Friday showed most corn farmers didn’t fare much better. The final report on the 2012 growing season showed farmers harvested 10.78 billion bushels of corn, less than three-fourths of what the agency predicted last spring.
While the report covers many other crops, much of the attention has been on corn, which is widely used as an ingredient in many foods, provides feed for livestock and is mixed with gasoline as ethanol. The crop also was the hardest hit by the drought that settled in just as the plants were maturing.
