U.S. farmers must soon make their 2015 crop revenue insurance decision, and it is likely that they will take reduced coverage per acre in reaction to certain financial considerations that could also impact production.Weather will now start to play a more important role in the markets. Temperatures across the western half of the U.S. have been 20-30 degrees above normal the past 10-14 days. This has totally melted any snow cover all the way into Canada. Having that occur this early automatically means temperatures will be above normal for this time of the year. 70°F in Fargo on 12 March set a new record. In fact, temperatures this warm and this early have only happened twice before in history. That will also break the hard red winter wheat c...
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.