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Production
Estimates and Crop Assessment Division |
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Production
Estimates and Crop Assessment Division |
October 20, 2003
By area, the state of Hidalgo, (map of Mexico) ranks among the smallest of all Mexican states involved in growing wheat, but is the top for barley and alfalfa area. Hidalgo was prominently featured in the news in mid-May 2002, thanks to the hijacking of a truckload of dangerous chemicals off a public highway. Positive publicity is difficult to come by for this small state, just north of Mexico City, which has few natural resources save mining. Agriculture tends to be small-scale, family operations. Agriculture remains Hidalgo’s main revenue-producing activity, and even that output requires some assistance from beyond the state border. Hidalgo does not have an abundance of rivers and large lakes to draw upon. Though spring rainfall amounts have been increasing since 2000, historical rainfall is less than 4 inches from January through the end of May 2002. In the 1950s, canals were dug to deliver a continuous stream of treated sewer water from Mexico City, 60 miles away, to Hidalgo’s most productive grain areas. This water delivery system permits the state to continue activities like corn production, in which it is a minor player relative to the national total. Irrigation boosts Hidalgo’s agricultural fortunes dramatically for alfalfa production.
During the 1990s, Hidalgo harvested more than twice as many hectares of alfalfa as any other Mexican state, except for Guanajuato. Thanks to Mexico City's treated sewage water, the yields are also quite high, frequently better than 100 tons per hectare, compared to the national average of 68-74 tons. Alfalfa is planted year-round, providing 9-10 harvests per planting, and is sold to livestock operations in other states.
Barley area has remained stable over the years; 98 percent of it is grown in the spring-summer cycle in dry land fields. Hidalgo accounted for 8-17 percent of Mexican area devoted to barley in the 1990s. Breweries are a main consumer for barley.
Corn has always been the number one spring-summer crop in Hidalgo, but as corn prices became more attractive in the 1970s, it began to appear in dry land fields previously dedicated to wheat. Inconsistent soil moisture conditions in the late 1990s made wheat a bad investment relative to other crops, so Hidalgo wheat area declined even more. Some families do plant wheat as their winter crop and corn as their summer crop, but the recommended planting and harvesting dates overlap and soil vitality usually becomes a problem with the corn/wheat rotation. The cycle that has evolved over the years on the better-managed farms is for oats, green beans, or some other vegetable to follow summer corn which is destined for feed lots elsewhere.
