Corn and soybean farmers and their vendors gathered in San Antonio for Commodity Classic have lots of things to discuss this year and the switch from corn to beans because of prices among the topics. Bruce Kettler of Indiana based Beck’s Hybrids told HAT on the trade show floor that they’ve heard of some intentions to switch.
“It’s not huge amounts, but a lot of our seed advisers are telling us that customers are still switching. I think they’re looking and watching the markets, trying to decide what they want to do. But in terms of seed availability that hasn’t affected our ability to be able to have either soybean varieties available. We’re still in very good shape on soybean variety availability. Nor on the other side on corn hybrids. So we had a great year in terms of seed production on corn and beans last year, quality is good – it’s actually excellent – so we’re going to be in good shape on seed availability for both corn and soybeans.”
Kettler said if a farmer senses that intentions to shift start to accelerate, it would be smart to get orders in as soon as possible to ensure the right supply is available.
“I think if they sense that’s going to happen, obviously being able to order it sooner is always better than later just in terms of getting it shipped, having it ready on the farm when the farmer is ready to go because we don’t know when planting season will start. But still we always expect to have plenty of seed available, even in season. We’ve got a good trend and can look at data from previous years to know what we expect to be ordered in season and available. Obviously just from a logistics standpoint being able to get it to the farm, it’s always good to have the orders ready and being able to have it in their shed so when they’re ready to plant, they can do that.”
The last 5 to 10 years more farmers are planting corn and soybeans at the same time and he said they want to have their seed on hand ahead of time anyway for maximum planting flexibility.
This year represents another record year of attendance with over 7,100 in Texas midway through the first day.