Soybean and corn prices already have fallen to unprofitable levels for nearly all farmers. The almost certain big crops this year in the U.S. and the likelihood of larger plantings next season in South America will probably result in even greater downward pressure on prices. Fantastic Crops in Northwest Iowa Driving approximately 200 miles across northwest Iowa to make a presentation yesterday in Storm Lake and Sheldon, there is no question that I have never seen better looking corn and soybeans in all my many years working in agriculture. One normally sees a fair amount of variability in the condition of crops. However, there was not one field this time that looked anything short of perfect except for a few where there was poor weed cont...
Grains posted strong gains today, putting the bulls firmly in the driver’s seat. There was no shortage of fuel for the move, with three W’s driving the rally: weather, war and worry. Weather: Cooler temperatures are temporarily easing stress across the Northern Plains and Midwest, b...
Key Takeaways: Global and U.S. cotton demand has struggled since the post-COVID-19 pandemic surge, which has left cotton prices drifting lower in the U.S. The war in Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, along with their impact on global energy markets, could boost cotton demand...
Key Takeaways: Persistent labor shortages are increasing operational challenges and costs across U.S. agriculture, particularly in labor-intensive sectors such as specialty crops, dairy, and meat processing. Immigrant workers, including H-2A employees, remain essential to the agricultural work...
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.