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: The Trump administration announced new tariffs of 10 percent to 12.5 percent on imports from 60 major U.S. trading partners as part of a Section 301 action aimed at combating forced labor in global supply chains. Countries that have agreed to adopt and enforce bans...
Key Takeaways: Grain futures pulled back sharply in overnight trade Friday on rumors that Ukraine proposed two possible options for ensuring civilian vessel safety in the Black Sea. Both Russia and Ukraine have recently targeted civilian vessels carrying oil and grain in the Sea of Azov...
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.