There is much gnashing of teeth over the persistent burden of the pandemic on the world but the trade sector appears to have overcome it, and its associated logistical burdens. The WTO announced that its forecast for increased merchandise trade in 2021 over 2020 was raised to 10.8 percent, up from the 8 percent it forecast in March. By contrast, the IMF trimmed its forecast for global GDP growth to slightly less than 6 percent. The WTO has trade growth slowing in 2022 to 4.7 percent while the IMF sees GDP returning to pre-pandemic levels in 2022. There is no breakout at this time of global agricultural trade in the WTO data. However, if U.S. trade is any example, exports are up by 24.9 percent in value terms, and imports have risen by 21.3...
What You Need to Know Today: The hot, dry weather forecast continues to drive strength in grain futures with corn and soybeans hitting another day of strong gains. Monday’s Crop Progress and Conditions data were in line with market expectations and showed relatively few concerns for the...
Yesterday we wrote about the Q1 GDP numbers and the June employment reports in an article entitled Real GDP for Q1 Relying on AI Buildout, Held Back by Consumer Spending. That article mentioned that consumer spending had become a drag on GDP. Nonetheless, real GDP in Q1 was revised upward to 2...
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.