The U.S. 2019 planting season is grim, and there is little or no relief in sight based on the latest weather forecasts. The Corn Belt and northern Plains will stay wet and cool for the foreseeable future. Most of the market chatter has been about the potential reduction in U.S. corn planted acres. That is important, but more critical will be the potential impact on corn yields. There is a direct correlation between late dates and lower yields. In addition to concern about how many acres of corn might not get planted, there is also the possibility some might have to be replanted. Today’s crop progress report showed that just 19 percent of the corn has emerged versus the five-year average for this date of 49 percent. Cool temperatur...
Energy: Risk Over Rules Fighting between the United States and Iran over control of the Strait of Hormuz escalated overnight. Tehran accused U.S. forces of striking a residential area after U.S. Central Command said its second round of attacks in three days targeted Iranian radar systems and mi...
Key Takeaways: Paraguay typically ranks among the world’s largest soybean exporters, with roughly two-thirds of its production destined for export markets, although most shipments remain within South America. As a landlocked country, Paraguay relies heavily on the Paraguay-Paraná...
Russian Grain Markets: 24–28 August 2026 During the fourth week of August, the Russian grain market continued to slide, although the pace of the decline slowed. The immediate market reaction and collapse in export activity have placed significant pressure on farmers. Price declines vary b...
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.