The new era of extreme price volatility coupled with very high prices and equally high crop insurance revenue guarantees have made it tough for the minor or specialty crops to compete with corn, wheat and soybeans as farmers make their planting decisions. The increasing shift of Northern Plains acreage to corn and soybeans also makes the problem worse. It is the rapid advances in corn and soybean genetics that have made these crops offer better returns per acre across an increasingly wider geography. This problem always comes to the forefront this time of year as farmers are completing the current harvest and at least starting to think about what they might plant in 2013. Those whose business is the minor or specialty crops have found it...
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...
Key Takeaways: Argentina is on pace for a record corn crop and record exports in the current marketing year, with abundant supplies likely to keep the country highly competitive in global export markets. Argentina’s record exportable surplus is allowing it to offer highly competitive pri...
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.