As the world's two largest soybean-producing nations, the U.S. and Brazil compete aggressively to supply the world's demand. Both countries have excellent farmland and farmers as well as access to the world's best technologies. However, Brazil may have a few other advantages. Poor Week for U.S. Soy Export Sales Today's USDA export sales report confirmed that last week was poor for U.S. soy export sales, at least for the current marketing year. It indicated net soybean export sales declined by 447,300 MT, mostly as a result of a 500,000 MT reduction in sales to China that included cancellation of 200,000 MT for 2014/15 and a shift of 300,000 MT to 2015/16. These changes plus decreases for unknown destinations (43,300 MT) and Panama (6,000...
What You Need to Know Today: A third U.S. border crossing (Columbus, New Mexico) has reopened to Mexican cattle imports following nearly two years of restrictions related to New World screwworm. The reopening could gradually improve feeder cattle availability, although more than 60 confi...
Yesterday, the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) released a new report of negotiated cash purchases of cattle under the mandatory price report. The report included Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Kansas. The goal of the report was to solve the confidentiality issues e...
Key Takeaways: U.S. soybean crushing began in 1911 and saw its most rapid expansion during the 1930s amid the broader agricultural and technology revolutions of the time. After peaking in the early 2000s, the soybean crushing industry went through a downturn as poor crush margins forced...
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.