Congress has about one week of legislative days to pass a continuing resolution (CR) for funding the federal government when it returns. To date, there have been no appropriations bills or a budget passed for FY 2014. House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) indicated late last week that he was considering bringing up a CR that would fund the government at sequester levels. That is current spending minus what would be put in place with another sequester, as was triggered last year in FY 2013. However, Speaker Boehner and the Republican majority in the House are proposing at this point that the sequester cuts would be extended into entitlement programs such as Social Security, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and other progr...
What You Need to Know Today: U.S. weather is getting more attention this week as conditions vary greatly across the western, central, and eastern corn belts, with the different regions battling dryness and too much rain simultaneously. The ProFarmer Crop Tour began today in Indiana and Nebrask...
Unlike the 2022 fertilizer shock, today’s disruption is rooted less in rerouted trade flows and more in damaged production capacity, raw material constraints and uncertain recovery timelines. That makes this a longer-duration risk for U.S. agricultural producers and retailers who must sec...
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.