The Philippines may increase its pork imports under a reduced tariff by over 600 percent, from 54,210 MT to 404,210 MT to better meet demand and reduce price inflation. The agriculture ministry says around 15 percent of the hog inventory was lost to ASF in 2020 and, as a result, it cannot meet 25 percent of the pork requirement this year. Even with the increased imports total supply will still be below levels before the ASF outbreak. Globally, pork production is down 8.1 percent from its peak before ASF and consumption is down 8.2 percent. Price analysis by Iowa State University indicates that China’s hog inventory is unlikely to return to previous high levels until well into 2022. Reports of a British gene-based ASF vaccine that was...
What You Need to Know Today: The Brazilian real surged to start the week after a surprise election result in which right-wing Flavio Bolsonaro won the first round of the election. The swing in the U.S. dollar/Brazilian real (USD/BRL) exchange rate caused soybeans to jump sharply higher in earl...
Key Takeaways: Harvest pressure is fundamentally a timing issue: supply arrives much faster than demand can adjust, creating temporary weakness that can occur across crops and regions. The intensity of that pressure depends less on crop size alone than on how quickly grain moves into the syste...
Pork packer margins closed out September as positive, marking an improvement in a challenging 2026. According to Sterling Marketing, for the week ending 26 September, pork packer margins were $6.98 per head, which is up from a loss of $0.13 the previous week, more than double the margin of $3.9...
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.