The big news of the week is USDA’s Prospective Plantings report showing farmers plan to sow more acres to soybean than to corn. If that outcome is realized, it will only be the third time this has occurred in modern U.S. farming history. The long-term dominance is why it is known as King Corn. The fact that fertilizer is now expensive and historically comprises three times the share of production cost in corn versus soybeans is the driver of this man bites dog tale. USDA’s report caused oilseed values to temporarily recede worldwide, but the bias is that farmers will plant more corn than they are contemplating today. The problem is that there is very little extra land to expand overall. The first quarter rally in commodit...
What You Need to Know Today: Harvest pressure in the U.S. sent corn and soybeans lower as supplies increased and there were signs USDA’s upward revisions to yields in the October WASDE could be close to right. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine escalated over the weekend, with Ukrai...
Developer's Note 24 August 2026: WPI recently completed an exercise that updated the codebase for this app and solved some of the discrepancies between our five-year average calculation and USDA's. There are a few lingering cases where early (late) starts (finishes) to the crop cycle resu...
Argentina Sunflower Sunflower remains one of the most attractive crops in Argentina, supported by strong demand and favorable prices that currently offer some of the best projected production margins among summer crops. Planted area is estimated at 3.0-3.1 Mha, with around 42 percent already se...
From WPI Consulting
Accountability and a comprehensive approach to export programming
WPI’s team helped construct a strategic approach to develop, implement, and track promotional activities in 8 key regions across the globe for an agricultural export association. With continued progress measurement and strategic advisory services from WPI, the association has seen its ROI from investments in promotional programming increase by 44 percent over the past 5 years. Not only does this type of holistic approach to organizational strategy provide measurable results to track and analyze, it fosters top-down and bottom-up organizational accountability.