USDA reports for August 2019: U.S. oilseed production is projected at 111.5 million tons, down 4.5 million from last month mainly due to a lower soybean production forecast. Soybean production is forecast at 3.68 billion bushels, down 165 million on lower harvested area. Harvested area is forecast at 75.9 million acres, down 3.4 million from the NASS June Acreage Report led by reductions for Ohio and South Dakota. These States account for almost half of the national reduction. The first survey-based soybean yield forecast of 48.5 bushels per acre is unchanged from last month but 3.1 bushels below last year’s level. With lower production partly offset by higher beginning stocks, soybean supplies for 2019/20 are projected at 4.77 billio...
What You Need to Know Today: The U.S. and Iran resumed missile strikes after a brief pause in fighting, raising concerns that the five-month conflict could expand across the Middle East. Jordan intercepted Iranian missiles, Kuwait reported a fatal strike, and drone attacks damaged two natural...
The Senate Agriculture Committee will take up the farm bill next week, and a number of amendments targeting the meat industry are expected to be offered. Two of the most potentially damaging are the Schumer amendment, based on his bill, the Family Grocery and Farmer Relief Act, and mandatory co...
Oliver Goldsmith's The Deserted Village, published in 1770, is of a timeless quality. It is a 425-line lament for a disappearing rural world, where prosperous villages give way to larger estates, fewer farmers, and emigration. One passage even follows those leaving for the new colony of Georgia...
From WPI Consulting
Illuminating the value of technical research
On behalf of a commodity producer organization, WPI evaluated the outputs from a project that featured a $5 million investment into technical research over multiple years. WPI’s team captured the results of this extensive effort and synthesized them for presentation to the organization’s governing board; among the findings uncovered and presented for the first time was the development of genomic traits proven, via rigorous testing, to provide crop yield advantages of 50 percent or more to U.S. farmers in times of drought. Capturing measurable results from long-term efforts can be challenging. Educating clients on the dynamics of success measurement when quantifiable results are not readily available requires deep client-consultant collaboration and an ability to consider both near- and long-term client aspirations with market/policy dynamics – attributes that WPI brings to every consulting engagement.