Pollsters say that Trump's disparagement of the Latino community has not broad-brushed other Republican candidates, but the rise of the anti-corporate welfare right wing could increasingly pose policy challenges for agriculture in Washington. Political Realignment The population subset most closely characterized as American agriculture has traditionally been mostly associated with conservative political philosophy, though with a seemingly contradictory embrace of government support when it comes to its own livelihood. Even the minority segment considered populist and left-leaning could not be thought liberal on all issues. The shrinking size of the agriculture population is why some Republican candidates campaigning in the state of Iowa h...
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...
Key Takeaways: Total U.S. crop acres (excluding hay) are forecast to expand fractionally this year due to greater oilseed crop and winter wheat plantings. One of the key drivers of this year’s crop outlook is input costs, and crops with a lower cost profile have an advantage in producers...
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.