Weather Predictions and Patterns to Watch For in 2023

Kevin McNew, Chief Economist at FBN® gives his prediction on weather patterns entering the 2023 planting season. 

In his latest video, he discusses drought patterns, where it is looking more wet and La Nina expectations. To discuss how this could have an impact on your crop insurance decisions, please visit fbn.com/MPCI.

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Audio Transcript

What can we expect for the weather in 2023? As farmers start to think about the growing season? 

First of all, as we enter 2023, we have a huge split where part of the country is super wet, namely California in the western part where we've seen just torrential rains. 

Then we have this lingering ongoing drought that is persistent for some time in the central and southern plains of the U.S.  and then we also have what is a third winter in a row of La Niña. 

So all of these factors are kind of shaping up for a challenging 2023 growing season as we look ahead. But here are some of the things we see on the horizon. 

First of all, La Niña likely starts to pull back and get us back to what is called ENSO neutral state, where we're neither in La Niña or El Niño.

That hopefully bodes well from maybe some of these longer term drought weather patterns shifting a little bit, not necessarily getting us out of the prolonged drought in the southern central plains, but maybe giving some modest relief as we move forward. 

Looking into early parts of spring, the forecast looks to be pretty favorable for moisture in the Pacific Northwest. Pretty favorable for warmer than normal temperatures in the upper Midwestern and northern plains. 

This was an area last year that really struggled with a lot of cold temperatures and delayed planting. So hopefully farmers in those areas will see better weather this coming spring. 

But in those really drought stricken areas, the western Kansas, Texas, into Western Nebraska, Eastern Colorado, there may be modest improvements in soil moisture, but overall it seems unlikely. 

We're gonna turn the tide really quickly on this prolonged drought as we move forward.

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