U.S. farmers seeded the second-largest combined corn and soybean acreage ever this spring, as concerns about global food security pushed prices for the crops to their highest in more than eight years, the U.S. Agriculture Department said on Wednesday.
But the total for each crop fell below trade expectations, sparking a rally in futures prices after the data hit.
Corn plantings totaled 92.692 million acres while soybean plantings came in at 87.555 million, USDA said in its annual acreage report. That compares with the government’s March pre-planting forecast for 91.144 million acres of corn and 87.600 million acres.
Analysts had been expecting the report to show corn acres at 93.787 million and soybean acres at 88.955 million, based on the average of estimates given in a Reuters poll.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Mark Weinraub)