Sustainability has become an important attribute for agricultural systems with many activists falsely asserting that extensive farming has a smaller environmental footprint. Now research by the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (ICTA), an organization focused on making small farms in developing countries both competitive and sustainable, has issued ratings that favor the larger, intensive agricultural practices of rich countries.
What is notable is that India’s agriculture ranks amongst the least sustainable systems despite being largely vegetarian in consumption and highly incentivized for extensive farming practices. CIAT weighed 20 different factors including greenhouse gas emissions, fair trade, food price volatilit...
Beef packer margins deteriorated to -$218/head last week, down $20 from the prior week as a softer Choice cutout combined with slightly lower fed cattle prices. The cutout slipped to $391/cwt while fed cattle prices eased to $256/cwt, leaving packer profits under pressure. Margins remain deeply...
What You Need to Know Today: The U.S. and Iran agreed to a peace deal on Monday with the deal expected to be signed Friday in Switzerland. The memorandum signed is explicit that Iran will allow 60 days of toll-free transit for all traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, and President Trump annou...
The U.S. and Iran announced a framework peace deal. Crude oil futures dropped to $83.08, the lowest since early March. The breakthrough comes as President Trump said that if Iran failed to reach a deal, he would order renewed military attacks. An LNG tanker chartered by India’s Petronet c...
