Fundamentally Speaking

As we noted in a piece earlier this week, the USDA September crop production report has come and gone with the 2024 U.S. soybean yield reported at 53.2 bushels per acre (bpa) which was unchanged from the record projection given in August, though right at the average trade guess and higher than last year's 50.6 bpa.

It's not surprising actually that soybean yields have held up so well given crop ratings around Labor Day were the highest since 2020.

The jury is still out however as USDA will release subsequent reports next month, and in November, then the annual figures due out in January 2025.

There has been a lot of talk that the past month from mid-August to mid-September which has featured above normal temperatures and rather sparce rainfall over much of the Corn Belt has had an adverse impact on bean size that could result in declining soybean pod weights.

Note that the September report did include objective field surveys from USDA enumerators in addition to the results from the farmer-based surveys and data from remotely sensed satellites that formed the basis of the August numbers.

On the other hand, the October and November reports will also include lab analysis measuring pod weights that will give a more accurate assessment of both state and national soybean yields.

USDA-NASS did provide a slide in their crop production presentation showing the September 2024 Soybean Objective Yield measuring the number of pods per an 18 square foot area and yield for an 11-state region.

As we have done in the past, this graph shows the 11-state objective number of soybean pods per an 18 square foot area on the left-hand axis vs. the implied soybean pod weight in grams/pod on the right-hand axis.

The 11-state weighted yield is also reported in the orange rectangles. The eleven states are AR, IL, IN, IA, KS, MN, MO, NE, ND, OH, and SD.

The chart shows figures that match up very well with the USDA as their crop production report says the number of soybean pods per an 18 square foot area in the 11-state region was 1746 which is what we have and appears to have a weighted eleven state yield that we have calculated at 54.3 bpa which is a record, surpassing the prior peak of 53.7 in 2016.

Note that the number of pods in this 11-state region of 1,746 is down from the final year ago figure of 1855, yet the 11-state objective yield this year is above the year ago 51.3 bpa.

This implies the average soybean pod weight is heavier and in fact we have calculated that at 0.35 grams per pod, here also the highest ever topping the prior peak of 0.343 grams/pod in 2019.

USDA data since 2012 indicates each year since then the number of pods within an 18 square foot region has increased from the September report into the final report by an average of 78 pods within an 18 square foot area, ranging from a low of 15 in 2012 to a high of 152 in 2018.

Given the rapid dry down of this year's soybean crop however, it seems entirely reasonable to suspect that the implied soybean pod weight may also decline in subsequent reports.

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