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MOORHEAD -- American Crystal Sugar Co.'s prepile sugar harvest
started Wednesday, with uncertainty regarding the government's
payment-in-kind program.
The prepile campaign will harvest 10 percent of the crop, with
full-scale harvest expected to start Sept. 30, said spokesman Jeff
Schweitzer.
The company estimates it will harvest 475,000 acres, not counting
any acres destroyed in the government's payment-in-kind program.
"Any PIK acres would go against that 475,000,"
Schweitzer said Wednesday.
The projected yield would be about a 20-ton-per-acre average,
which is typical of the past few years but ahead of the 18.5 tons
seen in the mid-1990s.
Total tonnage is pegged to come in at about 9.5 million tons.
Crystal also is predicting a 17.5 percent sugar content,
"possibly better, depending on favorable growing conditions in
the month of September."
That's in line with sugar content in the past several years.
Warm, sunny days and cool nights are the optimal conditions for
adding sugar in September.
Total sugar production will depend on how many PIK acres are
destroyed and where actual sugar content comes out, Schweitzer said.
Tom Knudsen, vice president of agriculture for Minn-Dak Farmers
Cooperative in Wahpeton, N.D., says his co-op's prepile harvest
starts Tuesday.
Minn-Dak will harvest 104,000 acres, up 2,000 from last year's
level.
That, too, does not count any impact from the PIK program.
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