Ignoring Margins The U.S. Senate’s Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy, and Consumer Rights held a hearing yesterday on, Reducing Regulatory Burdens to Unlock Innovation and Spur New Entry and the meat packing industry was front and center. UC-Berkely Senior Fellow Doha Mekki complained that “anticompetitive regulations abound including in the context of big agriculture fertilizer markets, the dairy industry, meat processing markets…” Trump Administration Deputy Attorney General told the Subcommittee that “We have heard from ranchers who can’t sell livestock across state lines because of rules that block out-of-state competition. To give just one example, it is illegal to sell a package of unco...
Key Takeaways: The EU's new deforestation regulations, taking effect 30 December 2026, could alter global soymeal trade through stricter traceability requirements and higher compliance costs. Brazil's complex supply chains are likely to complicate compliance with the new regulations, potential...
The brewing West Coast port strike involving about 250 maritime watchmen, or approximately 2 percent of port employees, has been postponed until 5 November after the workers agreed to extend the strike deadline. The watchmen control and inspect truck and employee access at terminal gates. A sho...
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.