By Don Shurley
Back in March, farmers said they intended to plant 9.87 million acres of cotton this year. If realized, that would be an 11.8% reduction from last year. Prices have not improved since then and expectations were that acres actually planted would be even lower than the March estimate. So, the contents of the acreage report came as a big surprise to me.
The June 30 Acreage Report was USDA’s first estimate of actual acres planted. That number was 10.12 million acres 253,000 acres more than the earlier March intentions number. This is higher than most observers and analysts thought it would be. Most believed actual acres planted would be less than what farmers back in March said they intended to plant.
