Many agree that the year just ending has been one of the most eventful 12-month periods for Irish tillage crops in quite a while.
The latest Tillage Edge podcast centres on a review of the cropping year that was 2022 in Ireland.
The featured discussion takes in the views of tillage specialists, Michael Hennessy, Shay Phelan and Ciaran Collins.
2022 crops year
Despite the challenge of high input prices, grain prices were substantially stronger and allowed for a very profitable year, according to the Teagasc experts.
This assertion is verified by the latest income figures from Teagasc.
According to Shay Phelan, the area of crops grown in 2022 went up significantly. “All the main tillage crops went up across the board, a trend that was driven by the Tillage Incentive Scheme that was announced by the Minister for Agriculture back in March,” Phelan stated.
“A number of years ago, we were looking a decline in the area of cereal and other tillage crops grown in Ireland. But this fall-off has been arrested.
“This year, we saw around 300,000ha of cereals, other combinable crops, potatoes and beet grown. This represents a 15,000ha increase on 2021 levels. Relative to 2020, the figure is probably up by 20,000ha,” he added.
Fertiliser prices
According to Ciaran Collins the 2022 growing year started off on a pretty nervous footing, given the growing pressure on fertiliser prices at that time.
“Uncertainty was a real factor in people’s minds during the early months of this year. Fertiliser availability quickly became the main issue, rather than the actual price of the product,” Collins explained.
“This was a direct consequence of Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine. A lot of focus at the time was on the more efficient use of fertiliser.
“Farmers were trying to make use of what they had. There was a strong focus on the need to make best use of organic manures.”
Meanwhile all of this was taking place against a backdrop of the quite flat grain prices that characterised the early months of 2022.
These trends had a major impact on the breakeven ratios for nitrogen that growers were calculating in early 2022, as they planned their cropping campaigns for the season ahead.
“There was a lot of uncertainty in the market as the new year got underway. But grain prices did start to increase as we got into March. They subsequently peaked in the middle of June,” Collins continued.
The three tillage specialists agreed that the strengthening of grain prices in the spring had a settling impact on the tillage sector across the board.
“But there’s no doubt that the overall uncertainty in chemical fertiliser prices helped put a very strong focus on the need to get the best possible value from organic manures, from a crop production perspective,” Collins further explained.
“And with the spring turning out to be so dry, we saw a number of farmers spreading in-crop manures. And, for the most part, this approach proved to be successful.
“We also saw a stronger uptake of soil testing, crop nutrient planning and a greater commitment to the growing of legumes, including beans. Overall, there was a greater focus on improved nutrient efficiency,” he said.
Crop production
According to Shay Phelan, 2022 will go down in the record book as a record year from a crop production point of view.
“This was certainly the case in many instances,” he said.
“Winter wheat had the joint highest yield that we ever had, rivalling what we produced in 2015.
“The likes of winter oilseed rape had higher than normal yields. And spring barley crops produced the highest yields ever recorded in this country.
“Winter crops performed well during the spring. They had been established in excellent conditions during the previous back-end and the winter that followed was pretty benign,” he added.
“So, from that point of view, cereals were given the best possible chance.”
As 2022 progressed, disease pressure levels on crops remained very low. According to the Teagasc tillage specialists, this factor also helped to boost final yields.
“It wasn’t an overly wet or overly dry spring. There was always enough rainfall coming along that kept crops ticking over,” Phelan added.
“There was no real drought scenario unfolding throughout the spring months. Temperatures were also pretty moderate at that stage of the year. As a consequence, crops kept on maturing at a very acceptable rate.
“There was also enough moisture in the soil to give spring crops an excellent start. The months of April and May saw a lot of green growth being achieved in these crops,” he stated.
But the one cloud in the blue sky that characterised the cropping year of 2022 was winter barley. And as the tillage experts were very quick to point out, two main factors combined to bring this about – the scourge of Barley Yellow Dwarf Virus (BYDV) and crops not receiving their first split of nitrogen early enough.