The recent Institute for Supply Management (ISM) reports indicate growth, although slow, for the economy overall. There is still considerable pressure on the ag and food sector, indicated by the concerns about inventories noted at the food service level.The service sector economy continued to grow in August, but it did so at a slower pace. According to the Institute for Supply Management (ISM), a Non-Manufacturing Index (NMI) greater than 50 percent signifies that sector’s economy is generally expanding and one below 50 percent indicates it is generally contracting. The NMI for August was 51.4 percent, down considerably from 55.5 percent in July, although it was the 79th consecutive month of overall expansion. Along with the NMI repor...
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.