Siloed Everywhere International trade has become moral, geopolitical, and nationalistic, and so has local commerce. Global trade is now based on perceived and relative practices such as human rights, animal welfare, labor, environmental protection, etc. Don’t trade with autocrat regimes like China or Russia. There is Make in India, Buy America, food sovereignty, etc. This has crept down to state and local affairs. California dictates how hogs are produced in Iowa and bans state-funded travel to Texas. Fights over abortion, immigration and other issues pour over red versus blue states, and between cities and rural areas. All of it worsening economic outcomes but unlikely to go away anytime soon. Separately, EU plans to punish a...
What You Need to Know Today: Grain markets were sharply higher overnight and through the day session as the concerning wet weather pattern persists over the Midwest. Grain traders – and soybean market players in particular – will be closely parsing both what is said and unsaid from...
Key Takeaways: Higher interest rates increase the cost of financing agricultural production, reducing farm margins without providing any corresponding increase in production or revenue. The financial impact of higher rates varies considerably by operation, with highly leveraged producers and t...
Last week, the Senate Ag Committee passed the farm bill on a party-line vote upon the return of Senators Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) and Tommy Tuberville (R-Alabama), who missed the vote on 6 August (see WPI coverage here) when it failed by a similar party-line vote, 10-11. Democrats held the...
From WPI Consulting
Forecasting developments in production agriculture
On behalf of a private U.S. agricultural technology provider, WPI’s team generated an econometric model to forecast the movement of concentrated corn production north and west from the traditional U.S. Corn Belt. WPI’s model has subsequently provided quantitative support to a multi-million-dollar investment into short-season corn variety development. WPI’s methodology included a series of interviews with regional grain elevators and seed consultants. Emphasizing outreach and communication with stakeholders who possess intimate sectoral knowledge – on-the-ground insights – is a regular component of WPI’s methodologies, made possible by WPI’s ever-growing network of industry contacts.