Organic Brouhaha At least four activist groups have charged that USDA guts national organic law. The agency purportedly changed the process by which otherwise prohibited substances (e.g. synthetics) are allowed in foods labeled as organic. Instead of going through the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) appointed by USDA, the agency itself may be making the determinations. The designation "organic" is not a science-based standard, but rather a politically-based marketing scheme. The NOSB is populated by six organic industry representatives, six activists (environmental and consumer) plus one scientist, the latter being a certification employee of the organic industry. If there is a real brouhaha here, it will make the 22-24 October...
As predicted, the Federal Reserve held rates steady at the last meeting before the midterm elections, likely in part because of the election (see WPI 19 October and 22 September). The decision comes at the tail end of a midterm election cycle that has been marked by the two parties campaigning...
Key Takeaways: The tariff burden rose sharply in 2025 and 2026: the effective rate on imports in HTS Chapters 1–24 increased from 1.53 percent in 2024 to 6.11 percent in 2025, before averaging 5.68 percent in January–August 2026. Headline rates tell only part of the story: exemptio...
Markets are getting into the Halloween spirit, handing out more tricks than treats. There has been some encouraging news, but it hasn’t been enough to slow the broader slide. Now buyers need to show up with something other than another “Charlie Brown” rock for the bag. Somethi...
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.