Small Decline in Canadian Canola Planting Predicted Agriculture Canada this week issued its first forecast for crop plantings for 2013. The report surprised analysts by predicting Canada's plantings of canola will decline from 21.531 million acres in 2012 to 21.302 million acres in 2013. That would be a decline of only 1.1 percent. The average estimate of 15 traders and analysts surveyed prior to the report was for plantings of 19.7 million acres, with a range from 18.5 million acres to 21.2 million acres. If the agency's forecast is correct, it would be the first decline in canola planted area in seven years.Agriculture Canada forecasts Canadian soybean plantings in 2013 at 4.792 million acres, an increase of 15.4 percent over last year...
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.