Last week’s hearings over proposed cattle market reforms took up nine hours across two days in both chambers of Congress. These hearings, like the six preceding hearings over the past year, were contentious, and now, a week later, there is no clear path forward. The Grassley-Fischer negotiated cash trade minimum bill is mortally wounded if not dead as more than 30 state cattle organizations opposed it and the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association (NCBA) also expressed its opposition during the House Agriculture Committee. There are other parts of the legislation that have more support. First, the contract library proposal that would establish a library for cattle formula and contract sales agreements like the swine indus...
What You Need to Know Today: Commodities were mostly lower across the board today after yesterday’s Federal Reserve meeting hinted at a potential interest rate hike later in 2026. The dollar index reached its highest level in over a year, and a strong dollar makes U.S. agricultural expor...
Tomorrow is the Juneteenth federal holiday, and the USDA, along with the rest of the federal government and the CME, will be closed, so the monthly Cattle on Feed report was released a day early. The total number of cattle on feed in feedlots with 1,000 head or more capacity on 1 June amounted...
From WPI Consulting
Forecasting developments in production agriculture
On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.