After inclement weather hampered harvesting efforts earlier in the year, it has been reported that German winter oilseed rape planting for the 2012 harvest is down, said oilseed association Ufop.

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This season, German rapeseed growers planted an estimated 1.33mn hectares (13,300km²), compared to 1.45mn hectares last year.

In Germany, the combination of an unseasonably cold winter, the lasting effects of the spring drought and heavy rain over summer led to losses and reduced yields. Much of Europe’s rapeseed planting regions, including France and the UK, looked set to lose crops to drought during the spring months, though in Britain conditions improved and gave rise to a surprisingly large, healthy crop.

Germany also suffered rain during the new planting season, which has led to delays in drilling for winter rapeseed. However, farmers and analysts are not expecting a repeat of last year’s disastrous conditions; the country, usually the EU’s largest rapeseed producer, expects a harvest of 5mn-5.5mn t.

The 2011 rapeseed harvest was estimated at 3.9million tonnes, down from 5.7million tonnes in 2010 and a record 6.3million in 2009. Around 75 per cent of the German rapeseed harvest goes to producing biofuels.