Yesterday we covered the quarterly Hogs and Pigs report from USDA, which showed the U.S. swine herd hasn’t broken out of its down cycle; the September inventory was the third consecutive year of a smaller herd compared to the prior year and the lowest since 2017. The same thing has not been happening in Brazil, however. The Instituto Brasileiro de Geographica e Estatistica (IBGE) quarterly report on meat and livestock was released yesterday showing that through Q2 of 2022, hog slaughter was at a record high of 14.07 million head. Slaughter was 107.2 percent of the same period last year, and 132 percent of 2017. The herd build-up was driven by China’s ASF situation and the global demand for more exports, but production has...
What You Need to Know Today: The hot, dry weather forecast continues to drive strength in grain futures with corn and soybeans hitting another day of strong gains. Monday’s Crop Progress and Conditions data were in line with market expectations and showed relatively few concerns for the...
Yesterday we wrote about the Q1 GDP numbers and the June employment reports in an article entitled Real GDP for Q1 Relying on AI Buildout, Held Back by Consumer Spending. That article mentioned that consumer spending had become a drag on GDP. Nonetheless, real GDP in Q1 was revised upward to 2...
Key Takeaways: The Middle East and North Africa's arid climate and limited water resources have created a structural dependence on imported wheat. Government wheat tenders in major importing countries serve as important benchmarks for global trade, providing insight into exporter competitivene...
From WPI Consulting
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.