South Africa's farmers have planted a record area to soybeans this year in response to strong domestic demand, which has been rising and is expected to grow further in 2015/16. Record Soybean Plantings in South Africa South Africa's farmers have planted a record area to soybeans this year in response to strong domestic demand. The government's crop estimates committee last week indicated the country's soybean plantings rose 23 percent this year to 620,300 hectares (1.53 million acres) and the area planted to corn fell by 1.2 percent. South Africa produced 944,340 MT of soybeans in 2014, and production this year is likely to exceed 1 MMT. That suggests the average soybean yield in 2014 was only about 1.87 MT/hectare (27.8 bushels/acre).Soy...
What You Need to Know Today: The Federal Reserve held interest rates steady at 3.75 to 4.0 percent Wednesday, with two officials dissenting in favor of a 25-basis-point increase. The Fed upgraded its assessment of economic growth from "solid" to "strong" but adopted a more patient approa...
Key Takeaways: Expected growth in U.S. soybean crushing capacity and output, driven by biofuel demand, will increase domestic soymeal supplies, with production growth significantly outpacing demand. WPI forecasts soymeal production increasing from 65.8 million short tons in 2026/27 to 70.5 mil...
Russian Grain Markets: 19–23 October 2026 The Russian grain market continued its recovery during the week, although prices remained volatile across regions. Wheat was notably bullish, while feed barley and corn were slower to appreciate, primarily because of weaker export demand amid logi...
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.