2009 Wholesale Sugar Production Outlook

Today we took a look at the most recent USDA "Sugar and Sweeteners Outlook"[.pdf] published January 29, 2009.

In this periodic publication, the USDA analysts take a close look at the industry all the way from the sugarcane and beet sugar crops and attempts to project what crop productions will look like in terms of tons of sugar production.

One of the things we found most interesting in the piece was the relationship between sugarbeet and sugarcane areas being harvested and the yield between the '98-'99 and the '08-'09 crop years.




It's interesting to see how (generally) the area planted has dropped for beet sugar, but the yield has increased fairly significantly. At the same time for sugarcane, the area harvested has also dropped, but yield has not increased as dramatically as it has with beet sugar.

Just what effect this trend is going to have on future sugar prices remains to be seen, but it will be interesting to see how it unfolds.