Weather woes cause American corn farmers to throw in the towel

In the nation’s 18 major corn-producing states, there has been one refrain for the past few weeks: To plant or not to plant? There comes a point of no return, where the cost of planting outweighs potential remuneration, where yields dwindle and there just may not be enough days for plants to mature before a hard frost. For many American corn farmers, that point is now. On Monday, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reported that domestic plantings were at 92 percent of farmers’ total intended acreage, the slowest pace in more than 40 years. Ohio trailed behind, with 68 percent of its corn planted, South Dakota had 78 percent, and Michigan and Indiana each had 84 percent of their hoped-for acres planted. Last week, the USDA lowered the projected total yield to 13.68 billion bushels (last year’s corn yield was 14.3 billion bushels). And as of Monday, in anticipation of an impending shortage, corn futures continued to trade at their highest level since June 2014...MORE