World Perspectives
energy

Farm Credit Situation

Both Farmer Mac and commercial banks reported a 7 percent increase in agriculture-related loans last year versus 2014. With an outlook for depressed commodity prices to continue (absent a weather event), Farmer Mac sees cost containment as the primary strategy for profitability.The House Agriculture Committee’s subcommittee on Commodity Exchanges, Energy and Credit held a hearing last week on the topic of Tightening Credit Conditions, the second of many expected to eventually be held by each subcommittee in relation to farm policy (see Ag Perspectives, 18 April). Following are some key observations from this latest hearing:

Commodity prices are dropping faster than land rents, putting a number of producers under pressure to service their...

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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.

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