It has been a volatile year for global sugar prices. They hit 27.95 cents/pound on 6 November 2023 – the highest since 1980. They fell 30 percent to 19.69 cents/pound in May and now are running around 20.26 cents/pound. It is difficult to draw a complete supply/demand imbalance as the rationale. Global sugar production has been expanding by 1.21 percent per year, but over the same period, global ending stocks have declined by 1.46 percent per year. Yet human consumption has only been increasing by 0.57 percent per year. It would be easy to blame biofuels except the change in biofuels demand is not that different than the change from human demand. The area sown to both sugar beets and sugarcane has been relatively static a...
What You Need to Know Today: U.S. and Chinese officials are expected to discuss agriculture and non-tariff trade barriers ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Washington later this month, potentially opening the door to additional U.S. agricultural purchases or improved marke...
The U.S. will observe Labor Day on Monday, 7 September. U.S. markets and the WPI office will be closed that day. The next edition of Ag Perspectives will be published Tuesday, 8 September...
Key Takeaways: Drought and changes to the multi-year trend in cow slaughter and retention have the potential to dramatically alter beef trim supplies and pricing, and WPI specifically models three different drought scenarios for fall 2026. Based on our models, WPI expects 90 percent lean...
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.