The farm bill isn't the only thing facing a 30 September deadline; so is the whole government. Congress has 12 appropriations bills to pass to fund the government for the 2014 fiscal year which starts on 1 October 2013 but to date the House has passed four and the Senate none. Under regular order, these bills should be passed by both the House and Senate in May after the Congressional Budget Resolution has passed and then the House and Senate bills are subject to conference. The House Budget Resolution passed 14 March and the Senate Budget Resolution passed 23 March, but the budget has not yet gone to conference. Below is the status of the Appropriations bills.A Continuing Resolution (CR) will be necessary this year to keep the gove...
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
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.