MEDITERRANEAN/MIDDLE EAST COMMENTS As had been expected, Morocco is dropping its soft wheat import duty from 135 percent to 35 percent effective 1 October. Morocco’s harvest dropped 49 percent this year due to poor rainfall. Wheat imports will be used to rebuild the national reserves and to maintain the wheat price in the market. The recent tender the Morocco set for the importation of wheat was cancelled due to no bidders – no bidders probably because the tariff reduction was expected. Good news for regional importers of wheat from the Ukraine as exporters are asking the government for an increase in the somewhat informal wheat export cap. The Ukraine government has suggested 19 MMT in wheat exports, but the exporters a...
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.