The U.S. Department of Agriculture released the Winter Wheat Production forecast for June 2026 and the USDA Chief Economist Justin Benevidez provides his observations on the forecast.
“The decline in production, I’ve realized this is going to be some of the lowest production since 1965, our lowest production since that period. Last year, percent rated good to excellent was around 52 percent, and we’re sitting right around 25 percent this year,” said Benevidez.
“So, I think it’s a story of two very distinct years, one in very good production conditions and one in fairly challenging production conditions, leading to that gap in year-over-year production overall. Low overall production, we’re at 1.03 billion bushels, which again, if realized, is the lowest since 1965, and that’s also on very low winter wheat, hard red winter wheat production, which would be the lowest since, I believe, 1957. So, all of that leading to some stronger price in the upcoming marketing year, but with the added challenge of the weather as it stands. So, definitely a story of drought throughout these spring months, sort of pressuring downward on total wheat production in most of the producing states,” said Benevidez.
Audio Reporting by Dale Sandlin for Southeast AgNet.