U.S. Department of Agriculture in its June 12 Crop Production report forecast 2018 U.S. winter wheat outturn at 1.198 billion bushels, up 6.174 million bushels, or 0.5%, from 1.192 billion bushels in May but down 71.721 million bushels, or 6%, from 1.269 billion bushels in 2017. The increase from May resulted from a slight increase in average yield, estimated at 48.4 bushels per acre, up 0.3 bushels from May but down 2.1 bushels from a year earlier, with harvested area unchanged from May at 24.769 million acres. The USDA production number was above the average trade expectation of 1.187 billion bushels. Hard red winter wheat production was forecast at 650.373 million bushels, up 1% from May but down 13% from 2017, soft red winter at 315.5 million bushels, up slightly from May and up 8% from last year, and white winter at 231.843 million bushels, up 2% from both May and from a year ago. The 2018 white winter wheat consisted of 21.829 million bushels of hard white and 210.014 million bushels of soft white.