Macroeconomics November Food Inflation Hits Highest Level Since May 2008 Food prices for this past November surged by 19.1 percent compared with November 2018. Since last February, monthly food inflation has now risen for nine straight months and has surpassed double digits from August onward. The big story or driver has been pork. Retail prices, which are what is factored into China’s Bureau of National Statistics calculations, jumped 110.2 percent in November compared with 101.3 percent in October. Other food items that experienced price upticks included edible oil, which was up 5 percent in November, driven by higher soybean oil prices. Similarly, prices for fresh vegetables were up 3.9 percent, while egg prices were up 10.1 perc...
The Trump import plan for 300,000 MT of beef supplies used for ground beef, i.e., lean trim, from September through November has, according to Secretary Brooke Rollins, brought some relief to beef prices. The Executive Order states that the Secretary of Agriculture will analyze and review the m...
Key Takeaways: Texas illustrates the assumptions underlying the 2025 FMMO reform; Idaho exposes their limitations. The Southwest order blend (roughly 27 percent Class I, 32 percent Class III and 31 percent Class IV) exposes Texas producers to every lever USDA adjusted, with a near-neutral proj...
From WPI Consulting
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.