Source: NCDA&CS, 7/11/17

Agriculture Commissioner Steve Troxler sits down each week with Southern Farm Network’s Rhonda Garrison to discuss “Today’s Topic.”
North Carolina farmers are planting more cotton and peanuts this year, according to USDA’s latest crop acreage report.

Cotton acreage is forecast to reach 360,000 acres this year, 29 percent more than a year ago. The forecast also shows 120,000 acres of peanuts being planted this year, a 19 percent bump over last year.
Both crops were forecast to see increases this year, but these latest numbers are even higher than the planting intentions report indicated in the spring.

Other highlights from the June acreage report:
• Soybean plantings are projected to be up slightly, to 1.7 million acres. 
• Winter wheat acreage was up 12 percent, to 470,000 acres, marking the first year-to-year increase in wheat acreage since 2013. 
• The report forecasts 880,000 acres of corn, a 12 percent drop from last year. 
• Fewer acres of sweet potato acres are projected this year, with growers saying they’ll plant 83,000 acres. That’s about 15 percent less than last year. It also is the end of an upward trend that started in 2014. 
• The flue-cured tobacco crop is still projected to be 160,000 acres, which is 3 percent less than a year ago.