Argentina experienced generally favourable conditions during the monitoring period. Wheat harvest ended in early January while harvesting of summer crops (soybean and maize) are still on-going. TEMP and RADPAR were slightly below average while rainfall was 50% above, which results in 16% above average BIOMSS. According to the NDVI based development profile, the NDVI peak during February and March was higher than that in 2015. Spatial NDVI patterns and the corresponding profiles also appear above average in 90% of the arable land during the summer crop season. VCIx map shows that VCIx values in the major maize and soybean producing areas (including Cordoba, Santa Fe and north western Buenos Aries) was above 0.8, higher than other agricultural regions. Altogether, the indicators show a promising summer season output. However, the 50% or more above average rainfall especially in April (refer to section 2.4) may damage the summer crops at harvesting stage due the potential flooding and muddy soil in the fields. CropWatch puts maize production at 25.7 million tons and soybean at 51.1 million tons, which are one percent above and below 2015, respectively.

(a)Crop condition development graph based on NDVI                                      (b)Maximum VCI

(c)Spatial NDVI patterns compared to 5YA                                           (d) NDVI profile