Canada: The good, bad and ugly of new crop profitability

New crop canola and oats look like winners while soybeans and barley appear to be dogs. At least, that’s the analysis from provincial agriculture departments in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. Manitoba’s crop production cost guidelines have been published for several weeks while Saskatchewan’s Crop Planning Guide 2022 is more recent. Cross referencing the two is an interesting exercise. In Manitoba, oats are second only to pinto beans for projected profitability. Average Manitoba oat yields are 110 bushels per acre with a new crop projected price of $5.75 a bu. providing strong returns over total costs. The Saskatchewan analysis uses a projected price of $6 a bu. Oats don’t pencil out very well in the brown and dark brown soil zones of the province, but in the black soil zone, where most of the oats are grown, the profitability matches the strong Manitoba numbers. On canola, Manitoba assumes a new crop price of $16.50 a bu., while Saskatchewan uses $17 and that makes canola one of the ...