COCERAL: Estimation of the EU grain harvest 2020 and forecast 2021
The umbrella association of European grain and oilseed traders has finally presented its estimate for 2020 as part of an extended preview of the development of the grain harvests.(See graphic above). For the EU 27 the harvest amounts to approx. 276 million tons . That is approx. 5% less than in the previous year 2019. The countries France with a harvest loss of -19% and Romania with -27% play a decisive role in the decline. In contrast, compared to the catastrophic previous year, Spain achieved an increase of + 41% and Poland an increase of around + 11%. Due to adverse cultivation conditions, Great Britain had an extremely poor harvest, approx. -23% below the previous year's result. In the other EU member states, the harvests were mostly just below the previous year's figures. A preview of the year 2021 (see graphic below) is essentially based on the known changes in cultivation area and the assumption of average area yields. As a result, the EU-27 grain harvest is expected to reach 284.5 million t .France with an increase of 9.5 million t , Romania with +5 million t on the positive side and Spain with -5.5 million t played a major role in the change of 8.5 million t in total , Poland with -3 million t and Hungary with -0.5 million t on the negative side. The overall result is in the good midfield. The causes are the changed cultivation areas in the vicinity of the average over several years and the assumed average yield assumptions per hectare.
