Those in conventional energy markets believe that if not for its adverse politics, there are plenty of philosophers in Washington who would raise the prices paid by Americans for fossil fuels. After all, these creations of Mother Nature are dirty and, importantly, their low cost undermines the successful introduction of so-called "green" manmade energy sources. But, a cheap energy policy remains in place in the U.S., as the chart below illustrates. This has not only encouraged Americans to continue buying sport utility vehicles, but it also affects the composition of agricultural exports.One interesting impact is how food is being used to arbitrage differing energy policies. As noted in the chart below, U.S. exports of dried egg, dried eg...
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.
Key Takeaways: President Trump announced $8 billion in additional agricultural assistance through the Harvest Fuel Relief Program, as USDA projects farm fuel and oil expenses will increase 28.8 percent in 2026. The package follows $12 billion in earlier relief, while government farm payments w...
Key Takeaways: A student group from the University of Chicago is protesting to bring back onion futures trading. Trading in onion futures was banned in 1958 following a spectacular bout of market manipulation that resulted in a corner of the physical market. The ban on onion futures led t...
Beef packer margins deteriorated to $141/head last week, down $55 from the prior week as fed cattle prices strengthened while the Choice cutout remained nearly unchanged. The cutout held near $373/cwt while fed cattle prices climbed $4/cwt to $224/cwt, narrowing processor profits. Despite the d...