As the partial U.S. government shutdown has moved into its third week with no end in sight, the nation’s press is increasingly focused on the ripple affect it is having on various sectors of the U.S. economy. An example is a recent article in the Washington Post that discussed how the lack of pay for Forest Service (FS) employees concentrated around Ogden, Utah – far away from Washington, DC – is affecting local retail businesses. The FS is an agency of USDA, and many of its employees are deemed “non-essential.” They are thus furloughed without pay until the shutdown ends. Numerous USDA employees in other agencies are also considered non-essential, including those who compile the many reports on crop productio...
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
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.