Those who default to the viewpoint that "big is bad" rarely get a good rebuttal. Now the U.S. Poultry and Egg Association has responded with a little history. Meating Unintended Consequences It is notable that two of the last issues resolved in the 2014 Farm Bill conference negotiations revolve around the meat industry. Conferees have decided not to pre-emptively change the Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) requirement ahead of a WTO compliance panel. There would be no problem if Congress were to quickly fix the law following a final WTO ruling, but these days there are very few successful legislative vehicles. The major components of the U.S. livestock sector say they are disappointed and will now advocate against passage of the farm bil...
What You Need to Know Today: The corn and soybean markets closed slightly higher in low-volume trade. The wheat market was mixed, with HRW continuing its downward trek on improved moisture. As expected, the bearish cattle on feed report drove down cattle prices and pulled hogs down with it. Mi...
Monday, 25 May is a U.S. holiday, and both the markets and our office will be closed. Please note that the next issue of Ag Perspectives will be published on Tuesday, 26 May. The WPI staff wishes everyone a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend...
USDA’s monthly cattle on feed report was released today. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity amounted to 11.6 million head, 102 percent of last year. Source: USDA, WPI Placements were up, but part of that is attributable to persistent drought c...
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.