Regional Updates MIDDLE EAST/MEDITERRANEAN COMMENTS Egypt is adjusting its ration card system, raising the value from $1.17/month to $2.78/month due to increases in local prices. It is also going to issue the cards by population segment to avoid some of the current problems with misusage. Most will be issued to those either on social security, suffering chronic diseases or having incomes less than $44/month (except for public sector employees who will be allowed to earn $83/month and still be eligible). With the bread subsidy scheme that covers about 80 million people, each recipient is permitted to receive five loaves of subsidized flat bread daily or opt to take the value as a subsidy on other commodities. As an illustration of the syst...
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...
Key Market Insights Geopolitical Limbo: Geopolitical risk remained a key driver across global commodity markets today. President Trump stated that the Iran memorandum of understanding is not yet final and warned that military action could resume if negotiations fail. Both sides continue w...
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.