In general, crop condition was slightly below average in Australia from July to October, which was the main growing season for winter wheat and barley.The spatial NDVI patterns showed that in southeastern New South Wales (24.8% of the arable land), winter wheat and barley enjoyed above average condition until the middle of September, while in southwestern Western Australia, southern South Australia, and northwestern Victoria (52.7% of arable land), condition was a little below average from August. In the southeast of South Australia,South Victoria, west of the border area between New South Wales and Victoria(15.4% of the arable land), crop condition was slightly below average through out the monitoring period. This analysis was further confirmed by the crop condition development graph based on NDVI, which shows that wheat and barley were, on the whole, above average in July, but that both deteriorated gradually from August, although crop condition was above average during the planting and early growing season from May to June. The below average condition was due to a general 37% decrease of precipitation compared with average, as mentioned in the MPZ analysis (section 2.6), confirming that irrigation could not compensate the decreased rainfall from July to October. In summary, CropWatch estimates that the production of wheat in Australia will decrease by 4%, but that wheat production in Western Australia would increase by 3%. (See also table B.2 in Annex B.)

Figure3.6. Australia crop condition, July-October 2014

(a) Cropcondition development graph based on NDVI     (b) MaximumVCI

(c) SpatialNDVI patterns compared to 5YA      (D) NDVI profile