Statistics Canada's year-end report should confirm higher yields for canola and barley than projected earlier this fall amid dismal weather conditions, said grain traders and analysts polled by Reuters. "With the superb November weather, a lot of grain was picked up," a senior grain trade source said.
Statscan surveyed 31,300 farmers between October 22 and November 19 for its last report for 2004, slated for release at 7:30 am CST (1330 GMT) on Wednesday.
The federal agency last surveyed farmers in early September, when harvest had barely begun because of late planting, cold summer weather, and incessant fall rains.
"The people who were surveyed at that point in time were pretty negative on what eventually turned out to be OK yields," an analyst said.
Conditions improved. Early October was uncommonly warm and dry on the Canadian Prairies. Farmers also got a final crack at harvest during a warm stretch of November.
"We got the crop off. Nobody thought we would get it off. Even though it might be a No 3, or a poor No 2, it's still off," a trader said.
Barley and canola yields were particularly high in Alberta, where weather conditions were somewhat better than in other provinces, traders said.
The weather hurt crop quality, challenging exporters who can usually count on ample supplies of top grades.
The Statscan report will give traders some firmer ideas about how much feed wheat they will have to find homes for this year, traders said.
"I think everybody's found all the high-quality stuff - but how big is the cereal crop in total?" an analyst said.
In Saskatchewan, which grows almost half of Western Canada's wheat crop, the provincial government estimated 60 percent of spring wheat was downgraded to livestock feed, compared with 1 percent last year and 7 percent on average. Traders said they expected Statscan would increase its canola estimate, although some thought farmers may have been tempted to under-report their actual yields to the agency, given that prices were falling as the survey was taken.
Several traders said they believe actual canola production exceeded 8 million tonnes, but they said Statscan would be unlikely to dramatically increase its October estimate of 7 million tonnes.