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UPDATE 1-Frosts reported in several coffee, sugarcane areas in Brazil -agronomists

Marcelo Teixeira

-agronomists@ (Adds comments from agrometeorogist, producer)

SAO PAULO, July 8 (Reuters) - Frosts were reported in several agricultural areas in Brazil over the weekend, including coffee and sugarcane production regions, as an intense polar air mass sweeps through the country.

Cane, coffee and late-planted winter corn are the most vulnerable crops in the south and southeast regions, where frosts were reported. The impact on production was still being assessed, agronomists said on Monday, adding that a better assessment could come in around 10 days.

Brazil is in the middle of coffee harvesting, and any impact would be felt only in next year's crop. Traders were expecting a record crop in 2020, when the country returns to the on-year in the biennial arabica cycle. But it is unclear whether production could surpass the 2018 record near 62 million 60-kg (132 lb)bags.

Rural Clima, a weather services company serving farmers and cooperatives, said there were frost reports in several states. It was stronger in the south, in corn and cane areas in Parana, but farms in states such as Mato Grosso do Sul, Sao Paulo and Minas Gerais, in central Brazil, were also affected.

"Agronomists are in the fields now evaluating damage. For coffee, it seems that young fields suffered the most, and the higher parts of adult trees," said Ludmila Camparotto, an agrometeorologist at Rural Clima.

She said coffee farmers might cut the top of plants to eliminate burned parts, preserving the bottle of trees in hopes of recovery for the next crop.

Frosts were more intense in Paraná, a less-important coffee and sugarcane producer, but the No. 2 grain state.

"Late-planted corn, crops planted around March, could have problems," Camparatto said, referring to fields still in the reproductive stage.

Simepar, Paraná's official weather service, reported intense frosts over most of the state on Saturday and Sunday.

Cane areas in Sao Paulo, Brazil's No. 1 sugar and ethanol producer, were also impacted.

Numerous pictures of frost-hit crops were posted on social media on Monday.

"But you have to be careful with that; it is hard to assess if all images are recent, and if frosts were widespread or only localized," said Vanusia Nogueira, head of Brazil's BSCA specialty coffee association.

Frosts usually hit low-lying fields and mountain tops strongly.

(Reporting by Marcelo Teixeira; Editing by Nick Zieminski and Dan Grebler)