Venezuelan strongman leader Nicolas Maduro told Bloomberg that he wants U.S. President Joe Biden to end the sanctions imposed by Donald Trump and to allow foreign investment in his country. Some U.S. Congressional Democrats support the change in policy. Maduro told Bloomberg that, “Venezuela is going to become the land of opportunities”. He said, “I’m inviting U.S. investors so they don’t get left behind.” The sanctions were imposed by the Trump administration after citing human-rights violations, rigged elections, drug-trafficking, corruption, and currency manipulation. Venezuela ranks number 177 out of 178 on the Economic Freedom Index, just ahead of North Korea. It received a zero for inve...
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...
Let’s return briefly to the fake meat hype cycle, now sitting somewhere in a dusty corner of your mind, not entirely forgotten. What happened to all those products, known as plant-based alternative proteins? They were supposed to be as good as real meat—cheaper, more environmentally...
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.