Bleak Harvest Ahead The world grain market may be headed into a bear trend due to burgeoning supplies, but a review of the policy seeds that have been sown indicates troubled harvests ahead. Argentina's Legacy of Failed Policies Argentina was one of the world's wealthiest countries at the beginning of the 20th century. However, it found itself only ranked 50th in 2013, and its economy continues to decline as a result of bad economic and agricultural policies that are likely to continue in the future. Biofuels Policy Headed for Reform The situation surrounding the 2014 Required Volume Obligations (RVOs) for biofuel was the predictable result of the original Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) of 2007 that created both the volume...
What You Need to Know Today: Harvest pressure in the U.S. sent corn and soybeans lower as supplies increased and there were signs USDA’s upward revisions to yields in the October WASDE could be close to right. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine escalated over the weekend, with Ukrai...
Key Takeaways: India is excluding sugarcane juice, sugar syrup, and B-heavy molasses from its 2026/27 fuel ethanol procurement program to protect domestic sugar supplies, potentially shifting additional demand toward corn and rice. India’s corn consumption for ethanol has surged from jus...
Developer's Note 24 August 2026: WPI recently completed an exercise that updated the codebase for this app and solved some of the discrepancies between our five-year average calculation and USDA's. There are a few lingering cases where early (late) starts (finishes) to the crop cycle resu...
From WPI Consulting
Forecasting developments in production agriculture
On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.