The U.S. agricultural sector was spared a direct hit from Hurricane Laura on Thursday as the storm veered west of grain export terminals in New Orleans and missed many fields of unharvested cotton and sugar, according to meteorologists and industry sources, reports Reuters.
The storm’s rains, however, are also projected to miss many of the driest areas of the U.S. Midwest corn and soybean belt that need them, including key producers Iowa and Nebraska, they said.
The Louisiana Farm Bureau said some sugarcane was blown over but production would be only minimally impacted as cane tops were not broken. Most rice fields had also been harvested ahead of the storm.
Crop damage may be limited in the Delta as the storm stayed west of major growing areas, but wind gusts reaching as high as 70 mph likely flattened some corn fields, meteorologist David Streit of Commodity Weather Group told Reuters.
