Reading China There is little concrete messaging from the U.S.–China trade negotiations this week, but an announcement out of Beijing may reflect positively for one American demand – addressing the issue of state-owned enterprises (SOEs). The government said that it will pursue supply-side structural reforms, including supporting the development of private-sector enterprises while moving faster to shut down poorly performing SOEs. However, the announcement does not signal any near-term bilateral agreement. In fact, the list of disputes is too long to be solved in one fell swoop. Moreover, the number of disputants may be growing. Europe has signaled its interest in a tougher line on China, and now some in Australia believe thei...
What You Need to Know Today: As was widely expected, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 25 basis points to a target range of 3.75–4.00 percent, its first rate increase since 2023, as policymakers respond to persistent inflation pressures. The Fed also signaled that additi...
Key Takeaways: USDA data access is equal; the ability to use it is not. Larger operations can afford experts who turn public reports into business decisions. Analytical capacity is the true advantage. Forecasts matter only when converted into profit, purchasing, and risk-management decisions...
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.