Food prices have increased but not as much as energy costs. The latest CPI data shows food at home increased year-on-year in April by 10.8 percent, and by even more for animal proteins. However, the cost of gasoline has jumped from $2.948/gallon in April 2021 to $4.213/gallon last month. U.S. energy costs are a third less than Japan’s, and only half as much as Germany’s. Energy is about 14 percent of U.S. agricultural production costs and likely a larger share in most countries, though it is substantially less a cost burden in Russia. Because shipping water is expensive and even more so when bunker oil prices are high, countries that produce food and extract its water using lower energy costs are more competitive in global mark...
Key Market Insights Macros: Inflation isn’t cooling — it’s moving higher again. March PCE inflation (Personal Consumption Expenditures index — the Fed’s preferred measure of inflation) rose 0.7 percent month-over-month, pushing the annual rate to 3.5 percent, the h...
An amendment to the U.S. House farm bill, aiming to remove the Save Our Bacon Act language in Section 12006 that would have stripped language to prohibit California’s Proposition 12, Massachusetts’ Question 3, and up to 500 state agricultural laws across the country, was blocked by...
WPI has officially launched Transportation Perspectives as a standalone weekly report separate from our Ag Perspectives articles and analysis. Current Ag Perspectives subscribers will have gratis access to the report through 16 April 2026. Please email us or subscr...
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.