USDA released its Acreage Report on June 30th and estimated
planted corn acres for 2011 at 92 million acres. The 92 million
acres is a 4 million acre increase – or a 4.5 percent increase –
over 2010 acres of 88 million acres. A complete list of acre
changes by state is shown in Table 1. In general, states in the
western corn-belt have large increase in acres. Somewhat
surprisingly, most states in the eastern corn-belt have not lost
acres. Of the 4 million acre increase, 60 percent occurs in four
states: - Nebraska (850,000 acres) - Iowa (800,000 acres) -
South Dakota (650,000 acres) - Minnesota (400,000 acres) These
four states are located in the western corn-belt where 2011
planting weather has been generally favorable. There are obvious
exceptions to this favorable weather in areas where flooding has
occurred; however, flooding has not resulted in acreage losses
causing state acres to decline below 2010 levels. Eight states
have increases of over 100,000 acres and account for 32 percent
of the increase in c