The South Dakota Corn Council and South Dakota Corn Growers Association announced on Jan. 12 that state farmers harvested record yields of corn and soybeans last year. In 2015, the state’s average corn yield was 159 bushels per acre, which surpassed the old record of 151 bushels per acre. Soybean production reached an average yield of 46 bushels per harvested acre, which also shattered previous records.
“The state’s farmers were blessed with timely rains and near-ideal growing conditions most of the season,” said Keith Alverson, president of the South Dakota Corn Growers Association. “Combined with improved farming methods, genetics and technology, we had an extremely productive year. It’s pretty incredible to think that South Dakota corn yields are double what they were 20 years ago.”
South Dakota’s corn crop was the second-largest all time with a total of 800 million bushels. Soybean crops reached a record high of 236 million bushels.
This information comes from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National Agriculture Statistics Service, which released its annual crop production report earlier this month.
The research showed that soybean production across the U.S. totaled 3.93 billion bushels, which is slightly up from 2014. Corn for grain production reached approximately 13.6 billion bushels, which is down 4 percent from the 2014 estimate. More information on crop production and forecasting can be found on the USDA website.