African countries attending a conference this past week in Washington on the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) pushed back on a U.S. suggestion that they begin to consider transitioning to reciprocal trade policies when the act expires in 2025. Corn Fight A Reuters news report indicates that China may be looking to dump its surplus corn onto the world market. Three state-owned trading companies will sell 2 MMT at below acquisition price, likely into Asian markets typically supplied by Western Hemisphere farmers, plus receive tax rebates. The move comes at the same time Beijing has imposed punitive tariffs on DDGS from the U.S. and Washington has challenged China’s farm subsidies in the WTO. All of this reinforces an EU suggestion...
What You Need to Know Today: Russia rejected calls for a ceasefire in the Black Sea, including a proposal to halt attacks on civilian shipping that could help restore grain flows from Ukrainian ports. Tyson Foods announced plans to permanently close its Joslin, Illinois, beef processing facili...
The big news in the cattle markets yesterday was Tyson Foods’ move to close two more beef plants. One of them, the Joslin, Illinois, plant was shuttered immediately after the announcement. The other, in Eagle Mountain, Utah, is a case-ready plant that does not slaughter cattle. Tyson also...
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) released the Consumer Price Index (CPI) on Wednesday. In July, the CPI rose 0.1 percent, seasonally adjusted, and rose 3.4 percent over the last 12 months, not seasonally adjusted. The index for all items less food and energy, or the “core” infla...
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.