Brazil Late Safrinha Crops May Face Moisture Shortage
By Drew Lerner
Kansas City, March 31 (World Weather Inc.) – Brazilian farmers just finished planting the second season (Safrinha) corn crop in the past few weeks. Soil moisture is still favorably rated today, but seasonal rains look to be withdrawing early by ten days to two weeks and that could have a significant impact on reproducing crops in late April and May.
Brazil farmers were late planting some of this year’s second season corn and some cotton. Planting of second season crops begins in late January and February, but this year’s crops were late planted because of the late planting and harvest of soybeans that the Safrinha crop normally follows. Some farmers have taken a significant gamble on soil moisture still being favorable when reproduction occurs in a few weeks since seasonal rains normally end in April.
Brazil’s rainy season typical ends by mid-April. Today’s computer weather forecast models have suddenly trended much drier over the next two weeks. If the assumption is made that the rainy season is nearly over some important Safrinha production areas will be drying down significantly over the next two weeks. The second half of April could turn out to be quite dry if there is no late season resurgence of precipitation across the production region.
Mato Grosso just reported its last plantings of second season corn in the past week and Parana reported its last plantings in mid-March. Crops planted most recently (in the past few weeks) will be reproducing at the end of April and into May. Soil moisture could be restricted by that time and any fields that are not irrigated may find reproduction occurring in a moisture starved environment.
Today’s soil assessment suggests adequate to excessive moisture from most of southern Brazil into a large part of center south and center west production areas. The region includes most of the more important second season crops that are produced from Parana and Sao Paulo into Mato Grosso. Rainfall in the next two weeks is expected to be quite limited and much of this region that is favorably to abundantly wet today will be running short on topsoil moisture, but still having adequate subsoil moisture.
If the monsoonal precipitation withdraws as the chart above suggests and there is not much other significant rain beyond mid-April additional drying would likely deplete soil moisture sufficiently to induce some stress for crops that are approaching, entering and in the midst of reproduction. Poor soil moisture, warm temperatures and limited rainfall during reproduction could reduce yield potentials.
There is still plenty of time for weather patterns to change, but there does not seem to be much potential for significant rain in the first half of April. Crops will develop just fine during that period of time because of favorable soil moisture, but if the dryness continues any longer there would be a fair chance of a moisture shortage during the late reproductive season. Early planted crops – those seeded in late January and February – will likely be done with reproduction before the driest conditions settle in. Early harvesting of Safrinha corn begins in May, but the late crops will not be harvested June and possibly July.
The first week of April offers no more than isolated showers and thunderstorms. Resulting rainfall could be locally great, but their coverage and frequency will be low enough that only a few locations can expect a net increase in soil moisture. The second week of April offers a little more rain in Southern Mato Grosso and in western portions of Mato Grosso do Sul and western Parana to provide a sufficient recharge of topsoil moisture. However, areas further to the east are advertised to 
be dry or mostly dry April 7-13.
Confidence in the two week GFS model run is high in this first week of the outlook and a little lower in the second week. It would not be surprising to see a little more rainfall evolve near mid-month, but the jury is still out on whether or not significant rain will fall in the second half of April. The situation will have to be closely monitored.
The CFS model was consulted for weeks three and four in April to get some idea as to what the trend might be. The model suggested precipitation will be less anomalous in those two weeks relative to the first two weeks of April. However, the last two weeks of the month should be dry or mostly dry in a typical year and the model has suggested near to below average precipitation. That implies rainfall will not be above average in late April. Near normal precipitation would still be too light to stop the net drying bias. For these reasons the situation needs to be closely monitored.
If the dryness occurs as described here, Brazil’s second season crops could lose some yield potential on the last 20-25% of the planted crop. This dryness would not only impact late season corn and cotton, but might impact sugarcane, late season rice, coffee and citrus. Out of these latter four crops sugarcane would likely be most impacted. Coffee, rice and citrus should 
be maturing and harvested when dryness is most significant and the impact would not be very great. Dryness in sugarcane areas might stress plants and raise sucrose values while expediting early season harvest progress.
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