CropWatch Cloud

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The reporting period is the main growing season for summer crops: maize, rice and soybean (Figure 3.8.a). Most wheat was harvested during the previous reporting period, after which late soybean was planted. The overall situation was average: Rainfall showed a 14% increment compared to average. Temperature was down 1.2°C and RADPAR showed a reduction of 4.3 %. BIOMSS showed an increment of 0.9% above the average and Maximum VCI reached 0.81; compared to the previous five seasons, CALF was reduced by 1% point.

CropWatch subdivides Argentina into eight agro-ecological zones (AEZ) based on cropping systems, climatic zones, and topography; they are identified by numbers in the NDVI profiles map (Figure3.8.b). Only four of them are found to be relevant for crop cultivation: the Humid Pampas (region 13), the Chaco (region 11), Mesopotamia (region 12) and the Subtropical highlands (region 17) for which the crop conditions will be discussed with some detail in this section.

Spatial distribution of NDVI profiles show better than average conditions for the main agricultural area of the humid Pampas as well as for Subtropical highlands during the critical period of maize and soybean (Figure 3.8.c). A more stable pattern was observed in the Depressed Pampas (also referred to as "Flooded Pampas") that are dominated by grasslands (blue area, 17.3% of agricultural land). In the Southeast of the Humid Pampas, a region dominated by winter crops, negative anomalies were observed for most of the reporting period.

Crop condition development graphs based on NDVI show below average values for the whole country, but NDVI values where higher than last year for most of the period (Figure 3.8.d). Humid Pampas showed values lower than average from January to March and no anomalies since April. Values were, as for the whole country, higher than last year's for most of the period (Figure 3.8.e). Chaco region didn’t show anomalies during most of the reporting period and showed values higher than those observed during last year (Figure 3.8.f). Mesopotamia showed almost no anomalies during the reporting period, but showed values much higher than last year's in particular during end of February and March (Figure 3.8.g). Subtropical highlands showed almost no anomalies and similar values to last year with the exception of a quite high negative anomaly at mid March (Figure 3.8.h).

VCIx map showed quite good conditions for the whole country which is dominated by values higher than 0.8, with the exception of lower values observed over Southwest of Humid Pampas and South Chaco (Figure 3.8.b).

RAIN showed high positive anomalies in Chaco (+44 %) and Mesopotamia (+26 %), while Humid Pampas showed a 7% increment in this variable (Table 3.7). On the contrary, a strong negative anomaly in RAIN was observed in Subtropical highlands (-32 %).TEMP showed negative anomalies for the 4 regions considered, ranging from -1.1 degree in the Pampas to -1.4 degree in Chaco and Subtropical highlands. RADPAR showed negative anomalies for these regions: Pampas (-0.7 %), Subtropical highlands (-7.1 %), Mesopotamia (-8.6 %) and Chaco (-9.9 %).

BIOMSS anomalies where associated also in magnitude to precipitation anomalies (Table3.8), being positive in Chaco (+18.8 %), Mesopotamia (+12.4 %) and Humid Pampas(+0.5 %), and negative in Subtropical highlands (-21.8 %). Maximum VCI was quite high for the Humid Pampas (0.88) and almost 0.15 lower for the other regions considered: Subtropical highlands (0.72) and Mesopotamia and Chaco(0.71). CALF was almost average showing slight changes for all the regions: HumidPampas (-0.33 %), Chaco (+0.02 %), Subtropical highlands (+0.04 %) and Mesopotamia (+0.14 %).

The combination of high rainfall, low temperature and low sunshine is likley to have affected crops negatively in some areas, also indirectly through increased incidence of diseases and interference with harvest operations.

Figure3.8. Argentina’s crop condition, January - April 2019