The Senate Agriculture Committee has had some unusual turnover this year, and more is coming. Following is a timeline of the changes. Senator Jeff Sessions (R-Alabama) was appointed to the panel and then left when confirmed as attorney general. He was replaced on the committee by his successor in the Senate, Luther Strange. Senator Strange later lost a primary to the controversial Roy Moore, who then lost the election to Democrat Doug Jones. The open Republican seat on the panel due to the Sessions/Strange departure went to Nebraska Senator Deb Fischer. Notably, her junior colleague, Senator Ben Sasse, left the committee at the end of the last Congress (making room for Sessions) to join the Armed Services and Judiciary Committees. As a res...
What You Need to Know Today: The corn and soybean markets closed slightly higher in low-volume trade. The wheat market was mixed, with HRW continuing its downward trek on improved moisture. As expected, the bearish cattle on feed report drove down cattle prices and pulled hogs down with it. Mi...
Monday, 25 May is a U.S. holiday, and both the markets and our office will be closed. Please note that the next issue of Ag Perspectives will be published on Tuesday, 26 May. The WPI staff wishes everyone a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend...
USDA’s monthly cattle on feed report was released today. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity amounted to 11.6 million head, 102 percent of last year. Source: USDA, WPI Placements were up, but part of that is attributable to persistent drought c...
From WPI Consulting
Communicating importance of value-added products
Facing increasing pressure to quantify the value of export promotion efforts to investors, a U.S. industry organization retained WPI to develop a quantitative model that better communicated the importance of exports. The resulting model concluded that value-added meat exports contributed $0.45 cents per bushel to the price of corn, increasing support for that sector’s financial support of WPI’s client. In addition to serving the red meat industry with this type of analysis, WPI has generated similar deliverables for the U.S. soybean and poultry/egg industries.