Japan Almost in Spades Donald Trump abhors trade deficits, but he found his more accurate language during a state visit to Japan this week in citing a legacy of incomplete trade reciprocity. Unfortunately, instead of offering facts like the need to lower agricultural trade barriers, he pursued the same interventionist, state-minded language as his target countries by calling for Japan to buy more U.S. military equipment and make cars in America. While the U.S. and Japan agreed to “accelerate engagement in trade,” this was encased in the language of state-driven mercantilism. The world trading system needs uncompromising reciprocity, not Manhattan-style baksheesh. Ponics for Work Once again, this week we are treated wi...
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.