The area sown to tillage crops is set to fall below 300,000ha for the first time. Preliminary figures from farmers’ Basic Payment Scheme applications for 2017 indicate a drop of over 5% across all crops.

A late surge saw increased planting of barley, beet and maize offsetting reductions in all other crops. Maize acreage, as has been reported here, has increased by half, with over 16,000ha of crop sown. Beet acreage is poised to increase by over 10%, with over 10,000ha of fodder beet alone, and another 700ha of sugar beet.

Spring barley is the dominant grain crop, surging by 7% to 122,000ha, more than all the winter crops combined.

Total cereal acreage will, according to these figures, fall close to the 250,000ha threshold for the first time – with implications for straw supplies next harvest.

Winter wheat acreage fell by 6,500ha to under 53,000ha. Winter barley dropped by a similar amount to 56,000ha, an 11% drop.

Of early sown spring crops, beans are down almost 40%, suggesting a decent protein payment under the BPS. Spring wheat area almost halved with only 3,500 ha in the ground. Spring oats is back over 20% to 7,700ha.

Potato figures are still sketchy, but recovering as a lot of May planting takes place.

Farmers have the capacity to change the crop options in their land parcels on their BPS applications without penalty, so these figures may change, particularly where farmers lodged their applications early in the planting season.