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Floods in several of Argentina's key wheat-growing areas threaten to damage recently planted crops and could reduce the 2015-16 harvest, crop and weather experts said on Tuesday.

A series of storms, some dumping as much as 200 millimeters (four inches) of water, have lashed wheat fields in southern Santa Fe and northeast Buenos Aires provinces.

"All crops in this area are at risk due to excess moisture," said Germán Heinzenknecht, meteorologist with the Applied Climatology consultancy

"We are in a part of the year when it is not so easy to get rid of that water once it is on the ground. It is not going to evaporate quickly," Heinzenknecht added.

The government forecasts the 2015-16 wheat planting area at 11.9 million acres, but has warned that the heavy rains could yet reduce that forecast. Argentina is a major wheat exporter to neighbouring Brazil.

"Soils are saturated," the Rosario grains exchange said in a report posted on its website. "Wheat fields are being smothered by water. There is the risk of serious losses."

Independent analysts had already told Reuters that Argentina's 2015-16 wheat crop was expected to fall to 10 million to 10.5 million tonnes from the 13.9 million that the agriculture ministry said was collected in the previous season, due to surpluses left over from that crop year.

Source: Reuters