China Expanding Blockage of Imports from Canada It appears that China has raised the pressure on Canada to release the Huawei Technologies CFO. After she was arrested at the request of the U.S., the Chinese government began rejecting shipments of Canadian canola, ostensibly because of phytosanitary violations. This halted those exports to China at a great cost to the Canadian canola industry. Now exporters indicate China has begun tightened inspections of Canadian soybean shipments, which has effectively brought them to a stop as well. They were normally cleared by Chinese customs officials within a few days but now must wait more than three weeks and are sometimes rejected. One shipment of about 680 MT in containers was blocked, supposed...
Key Market Insights The broad market is locked in on this week’s Trump-Xi meeting in Beijing, but this is no longer just a trade summit. Increasingly, the meeting is becoming tied directly to Iran, energy security, and the growing global economic fallout from disruptions through the Strai...
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.