Trade Negotiation Hurdles U.S. and EU trade negotiators meet again tomorrow in a bid to reach an agreement by 9 July; there is a lot of skepticism about its relative success. Politico Europe reporter Camille Gijs notes that politicians in Brussels have no appetite to give the White House big concessions. She notes that most of the same “inflammatory topics” underwent three years of negotiating effort under the TTIP talks that ended unsuccessfully in 2013. How can they now suddenly be resolved in six weeks? To correct an imbalance requires the favored party to give more, and that is politically unsaleable in Europe. The EU wants to keep its regulations, guard its agricultural sector, and get rid Trump’s 10 percent tar...
What You Need to Know Today: Wheat futures pulled back sharply after Russian President Putin said there was a “chance” for peace and an agreement to end the war in Ukraine. There is plenty of skepticism about the opportunity for peace in Ukraine, but that didn’t stop wheat fr...
President Trump has opened the door to 100,000 MT of beef lean trimmings (limited to HTS codes 0201.30.5091, 0201.30.5097, 0202.30.5091, and 0202.30.5097) from countries listed under the “Other Countries” TRQ effective 1 September. These imports would not be subject to the over-quot...
Key Takeaways: CHS and OCP plan to invest up to $450 million in a Louisiana phosphate fertilizer facility capable of producing more than 1 MMT annually, marking the first new U.S. plant of its kind in more than 40 years. The facility could reduce U.S. dependence on imported finished phosphate...
From WPI Consulting
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.