Original story at farmdoc daily
Weekly Farm Economics
The Curious Case of US Corn Yields in 2023
Nick Paulson, Gary Schnitkey, and Jim Baltz
Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics
University of Illinois
Carl Zulauf
Department of Agricultural, Environmental and Development Economics
Ohio State University
March 19, 2024
farmdoc daily (14):55
Recommended citation format: Paulson, N., G. Schnitkey, C. Zulauf and J. Baltz. “The Curious Case of US Corn Yields in 2023.” farmdoc daily (14):55, Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, March 19, 2024.
Despite concerns over dry weather and drought conditions in June of 2023, the US produced a record corn crop of more than 15.3 billion bushels. However, average corn yield performance varied considerably across the US in 2023. Many counties achieved good to excellent yields relative to trend estimates, but other counties had yields well below trend.
Herein, we report recently released yields from the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) of the USDA. NASS yields are not used in calculating payments from county-based insurance products or the Agriculture Risk Coverage at the county level (ARC-CO) program. However, NASS yields are highly correlated with the yields from RMA (Risk Management Agency) and FSA (Farm Service Agency) that will determine payments. NASS county yields suggest payments from area-based insurance, including the SCO (Supplemental Coverage Option) and ECO (Enhanced Coverage Option) programs, are likely for a number of counties for the 2023 corn crop. ARC-CO may trigger payments in a limited number of counties whose yields were significantly below trend.
2023 County Corn Yields
NASS, an agency of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, recently released their survey-based county yield estimates for 2023 (see Figure 1). Counties in the green categories had 2023 yields above the national average of 177.3 bushels per acre.
