Skyrocketing Food Safety: Food and Chemical News reported that the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) watered down regulatory requirements for implementing the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA). OMB stripped out requirements for product and environmental testing, maintaining a supplier approval and verification program and other obligations sought by FDA. David Plunkett of the Center for Science in the Public Interest stereotypically said, "It's OMB once again protecting corporate bottom lines at the expense of protection for public health." What Plunkett and his ilk would really like to do is get rid of Circular A-94, the now decades-old procedural guidelines for OMB regulatory review. It requires the agency to actually...
Last week, September inflation reports showed that the Producer Price Index rose 1.3 percent, far ahead of the 0.6 percent consensus expectation, while the Consumer Price Index (CPI) rose 0.6 percent, in line with expectations. However, September also marked the 66th consecutive month that both...
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.