Dakotas Might See Record Sunflower Yields

Sunflower crops could set records in the nation's top two producing states this year, helping to blunt a drop in nationwide production and ensure a healthy supply for processors in the United States and Canada.

The good year for growers in North Dakota and South Dakota in turn might help keep consumer prices down for foods that use sunflower oil although worries remain about the weather-delayed harvest.

"Any time that the crop stands out there longer, obviously there's potential (for damage)," said John Sandbakken, international marketing director for the National Sunflower Association.

The last official estimate Nov. 9 said less than one-third of the crop had been harvested in the Dakotas, which produce 75 percent of the nation's sunflowers.

Sunflowers are used primarily for cooking oil. Production nationwide is expected to be down 13 percent this year, because of a drop in planted acres due to competition from highly profitable crops such as soybeans and spring flooding in North Dakota that prevented some fields from being seeded.

Tom Young, who farms near the central South Dakota town of Onida, said some farmers are just starting to get into the fields to harvest the crop because of a wet fall.

"I'm not even half done," he said. "It wasn't too many years ago we were done by the first weekend of pheasant season, the third week of October."

But all indications are that the crops are still in good shape. The Agriculture Department is projecting an average sunflower yield of 1,809 pounds per acre in South Dakota, which would be a record for the second consecutive year. The estimate for North Dakota is 1,557 pounds, only 29 pounds shy of the 2005 record. Without the high yields, U.S. production would be down even more.

Sandbakken said stocks were high coming into the marketing year that began Oct. 1, so he does not expect the smaller crop to have a big influence on prices in the short term.