India coalesced the developing nations in 2001 and forced the rich countries to accept the “Development” part in the WTO’s Doha Development Round. Now that U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer has figured out that development as pushed by India means the rich countries give and the developing countries take, his departure message this week at the WTO Ministerial Conference (MC 11) in Buenos Aires is more sectoral agreements. UN-ification is the term now given to the WTO by old hands that have watched the organization evolve to where it is today. In the past, rich countries agreed among themselves where to liberalize and then shared their concessions as nonreciprocal benefits to the developing countries via the most...
The corn and soy complex closed higher, with the wheat market mixed, as winter wheat closed up but spring wheat and livestock ended lower. Part of the strength for corn and soybeans may have been a weather premium, as crop planting has started out fast but warm weather has been slow to develop...
Real GDP grew at a 2 percent annual rate in the first quarter of 2026, slightly below the consensus expectation of 2.3 percent but above the 0.5 percent growth in Q4 2025. The GDP number matches the average annualized pace of growth since the peak back in late 2007, right before the Financial P...
Reflect for a moment on what you eat. There is a lot of advice out there in the ether about what you should eat, but really, what do you currently eat and how much? The good people at the USDA have some data for you, to help you answer that question. USDA says that we eat quite a bit of meat. L...
From WPI Consulting
Infrastructure investment due diligence
On behalf of a Canadian oilseed processer WPI's team provided market analysis, econometric modeling and financial due diligence in support of a $24 million-dollar investment in a Ukrainian crush plant. Consistent with WPI's findings, local production to supply the plant and the facility's output have expanded exponentially since the investment. WPI has conducted parallel work on behalf of U.S., South American and European clients, both private and public, in the agri-food space.