Poor yields expected from several late-harvest crops in Hungary due to drought and heat

According to the information, the weather has been mostly dry over the past week, with only a small area in the western part of the Transdanubian region receiving more than 5 mm of precipitation on Sunday.

July precipitation totals in the central and eastern parts of the Transdanubian region and in the western parts of the Great Plain will be less than 5 mm, and in some places less than 1 mm, they warned. In the western, south-western and north-north-eastern border regions and several parts of the Great Plain, heavy showers and downpours occurred, resulting in 30-80 millimetres of rainfall last month, but the monthly rainfall totals for July are still almost below the long-term average. In significant areas, the deficit is as high as 30-70 millimetres, they pointed out.

The top half metre of the soil contains only patches of sufficient moisture, but there are still moisture reserves in the regions deeper than half a metre, and especially deeper than 1 metre.

Temperatures rose day by day in the second half of last week, but Sunday's cold front cooled the air slightly, they wrote.

Vegetation, including planted crops, is a good three weeks ahead of normal.

Sunflowers have finished blossoming, and maize is also beginning to dry, with ripening now underway.

However, for ideal growth, irrigation is necessary due to the lack of rainfall.

Drought and heat will also have an impact on yields,

according to Hungaromet.

They added that since last week was also characterised by drought, the duration of leaf wetness only exceeded ten hours in patches in the northeast last Thursday and in the west on Sunday. The duration of humid periods was also short, so the dry spell did not support the development of fungal diseases.

The weather is expected to remain warm, with a higher chance of precipitation mainly in the Transdanubian region on Friday and in the north-eastern part of the country on Saturday, while from Sunday onwards dry weather is likely again, with a chance of showers and thunderstorms on Monday at the most.

Soil drying is forecast to continue in most parts of Hungary and the drought is expected to worsen.

This does not bode well at all for the performance of Hungarian agriculture this year, and is another risk to economic growth in 2024. In recent days, new reports have emerged of worsening growth forecasts, due to worse-than-expected second quarter GDP growth. In the light of this, the previous growth plan of 2.5% for this year already looks dreamlike.