House bill tightens market oversight
	FINcast is on the air
	USDA appropriations signed by Obama
	Conservation initiatives funds scrutinized
	Markets: weather, dollar and energy
	Fuel costs for ag to skyrocket
	The other fitness
	Agricultural Outlook Forum agenda released
	USDA announces DCP, ACRE numbers
	Soybean seed quality concerns
	Do oil and ag mix?
	Thank you Normal Borlaug
	Crop insurance can salvage some loss

Combines are rolling and driers are firing up across much of the Midwest as the harvest clock in the sky warns of changing seasons. Yet still the rains are falling and corn is standing in many places, a real race against time to get the crop to market.

In the news this week, following deals and compromises that ended only shortly before the hearing began, the House Agriculture Committee last week passed HR 3795 — more commonly known as the “derivatives oversight” legislation — by a bipartisan voice vote. Also this week, if you're looking for the latest in ag-related news and want an easy way to get up-to-date, take a test drive of the new FINcast at Farm Industry News. This is the debut week for a new and exciting multimedia program that just might offer up the right information and resources to help you on the farm. Elsewhere, President Obama has signed legislation providing fiscal 2010 appropriations — $121 billion — for the USDA, the Department of Health and Human Services, and other agencies. What does this mean for farmers? Explore the issue below.

You'll find these stories and a great deal more in this issue of Crop News Weekly. Happy reading.

Following deals and compromises that ended only shortly before the hearing began, the House Agriculture Committee last week passed HR 3795 — more commonly known as the “derivatives oversight” legislation —by a bipartisan voice vote.

“This is the third time we’ve moved on this legislation,” said Rep. Colin Peterson of Minnesota, chairman of the committee, at the outset of the hearing. “This builds on the bill we passed in February, HR 977.

“We’ve made significant improvements, incorporated ideas from the (Obama) administration, and from a lot of other folks we’ve talked to. We have a bill here that will bring all these dark markets into regulation and transparency and preclude the kind of problems we’ve had in the financial system from happening in the future.” - David Bennett, Farm Press Editorial Staff

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FINcast is a brand new video news update and available exclusively at Farm Industry News. Check out the home page and follow the link to the first FINcast and get up-to-date with the kind of news you can use. Editors Karen McMahon and Jodie Wehrspann discuss new products and technologies including new utility vehicles from Case IH and New Holland; new high-horsepower row-crop tractors; new technologies used to reduce refuges including SmartStax; field mapping by AgriImaGIS; and guidance equipment that taps into DOT CORS networks. Log on now!

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President Obama has signed legislation providing fiscal 2010 appropriations — $121 billion — for the USDA, the Department of Health and Human Services, and other agencies.

A nod to those struggling in a rocky economy, HR 2997 includes nearly $100 billion — or 80 percent of the funds — is designated for food stamps and school nutrition programs. Just over $58 billion — a rise of over $4 billion from 2009 — will go to food stamps. WIC, a federal assistance program for Women, Infants and Children, also received a funding bump to $7.3 billion. School nutrition program funding also leapt $1.9 billion for a total just under $17 billion.

Of the remaining HR 2997 funds, slightly over $23 billion will be spread among programs for agricultural research, conservation, food safety, housing assistance and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). - David Bennett, Farm Press Editorial Staff

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Broad conservation initiatives being undertaken by the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) were given extra scrutiny at an Oct. 7 hearing on the implementation of the farm bill’s conservation title.

In going after some of the bigger conservation issues, Dave White, NRCS chief, told the House Agriculture Subcommittee on Conservation, Credit, Energy, and Research that the NRCS is using the “Chesapeake Bay (Watershed Program) as a model.”

The new Chesapeake Bay effort uses resources from many conservation groups to clean up the threatened watershed and was explicitly approved in the latest farm bill. White told the subcommittee a similar effort was under way in the Mississippi River Basin and others are being considered.

This did not sit well with several subcommittee members. - David Bennett, Farm Press Editorial Staff

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There is some speculation that some crop acres in the United States may not get harvested until next year. Lower relative dollar values are supporting increased grain exports. Higher energy prices are supporting biofuel prices.

Weather problems include quality decimation from diseases, lodging and high moisture. Oil and palm oil prices have been supportively higher. Farmer selling slows down each time prices drop. Leaf drop advanced to 95 percent of the crop. Only 30 percent of soybeans are harvested compared to a 72 percent 5 year average.

Corn selling by farmers has slowed again. Any increase in prices will stimulate increased selling. Corn is 83 percent mature. Only 17 percent of corn is harvested where 46 percent is the five-year average. Farmers are concentrating on bean harvest. Most corn is mature and harvest postponed. Argentine farmers are expected to decrease corn acres this season. - Ray Nabors, Heartland Ag Network

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A crop and livestock producer from Texas today said cap-and-trade climate change legislation could hike the cost of fuel used for farming to the point that it will have a devastating economic impact on his and similar family-owned businesses.

Speaking at a Capitol Hill news conference, Texas farmer and cattle producer Richard Cortese said increased fuel prices, on top of other energy-related costs, would deal a sharp blow to farmers and ranchers. Cortese, who farms near Little River, Texas, is a member of the Texas Farm Bureau board of directors.

The event, hosted by Sens. Kit Bond (R-Mo.) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), highlighted a new report the senators released showing that cap-and-trade legislation will result in a considerable fuel tax increase on Americans. The senators’ report is the first such effort to quantify climate change legislation’s effect on fuel costs.

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A friend of mine has a Web site and writes a column there, as well as for a couple of other outlets. He's a guy by the name of Chuck Offenburger and he used to be a columnist for the Des Moines Register. One of Chuck's recent entries detailed some farm neighbors of his near metropolitan Cooper, IA, who were beginning the soybean harvest. The surprising part for a lot of people, Chuck included, was the technological way in which you determine if your soybeans are ready to be harvested. In the business, we call that condition being fit. If your beans are fit, you can crack the pods open fairly easily and then bite into a bean. If it's really hard to bite through, your beans are ready to go. If you chip a tooth, you probably should have been going for a couple days already. Of course, peer pressure being what it is in agriculture, few people get that far behind their neighbors when everyone else is having fun with their toys. - Jeff Ryan, Farm Industry News

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Speakers at the 2010 Agricultural Outlook Forum will include the co-president of Whole Foods, the recently retired CEO of Sysco Corporation and the CEO of Bon Appétit Management Company.

The 2010 Outlook Forum will be held Feb. 18-19 at the Crystal Gateway Marriott Hotel in Arlington, Va.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will keynote the forum titled “Sustainable Agriculture: The Key to Health & Prosperity.” Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan will open the annual forum on Feb. 18 at 8 a.m.

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Approximately 255 million base acres on about 1.7 million farms were enrolled for 2009 in the Direct and Counter-cyclical Program (DCP) and in the Average Crop Revenue Election (ACRE) program.

And USDA will issue nearly $4 billion in 2009 final direct payments to eligible producers on approved contracts. Producers have already received advance payments of approximately $900 million.

“The sign-up numbers demonstrate producers value having the option of two programs from which to choose the greatest benefit to their individual farming operation,” said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack. “I also want to remind all producers that 2010 sign up for DCP and ACRE has already started and the deadline is June 1, 2010.”

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A prolonged, drying sun can’t reach the Mid-South quickly enough for farmers. And following weeks of rain, fears for soybean seed quality have ratcheted up. Soybean damage field guide available Markets weather-driven — corn, soy, cotton Childers urges swift disaster relief“It’s hard to be patient but what else can we do?” says Brent Griffin, Arkansas’ Prairie County Extension staff chair. “We’re doing a seed quality survey to get an early sample of what to expect. It looks like we may be in a severe state regarding quality soybean seed to plant in 2010. I’m hearing the situation looks close to the problems we saw in 2007. And I’m sure growers remember what the seed quality looked like in 2008.”

In southeast Missouri, Grover Shannon echoes the concern. A soybean breeder and University of Missouri professor stationed at the Delta Center in Portageville, Mo., Shannon says the region is waterlogged. - David Bennett, Farm Press Editorial Staff

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Oil companies have entered the biofuels business. How will that affect growers who produce feedstocks for the plants?

TEN COMPANIES currently control more than 80% of U.S. refinery capacity. Of those 10, most have entered into the biofuels business through outright acquisition or research investments. What could this mean to the U.S. ethanol and biodiesel industries and the growers who produce the feedstocks for them? Can oil and ag mix?

The two industries are already mixed today. The major oil companies have become players because they have been required by law (through the Renewable Fuel Standard, RFS) to blend ethanol into their gasoline pool or pay significant fines. - Lynn Grooms, Farm Industry News

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THE DEATH of modern agriculture's biggest champion, Norman Borlaug, is a great loss. Who better to be frank about the use of biotechnology to feed a starving world than the well-decorated humanitarian Borlaug? The online encyclopedia Wikipedia reports that Borlaug saved more than a billion people from starvation through his work in plant pathology and genetics. Much of his work was in wheat where he helped double yields. These genetic strides spawned the term “Green Revolution.”

So when Borlaug stated in an interview with Reason in 2000 that using organics to feed the world is “ridiculous; this shouldn't even be a debate,” people listened.

In that famous interview, Borlaug went on to say that producing enough manure to fertilize crops to feed the world would require another 5 or 6 billion head of cattle. “How much wild land would you have to sacrifice just to produce the forage for these cows? There's a lot of nonsense going on here,” he said. - Karen McMahon, Farm Industry News

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Near-constant rains during harvest-time have cost Mississippi farmers an estimated $371 million in losses, and producers with crop insurance may be the only ones able to salvage much more from the fields this year.

Cotton is expected to take the biggest hit, losing 43 percent of its potential value. Most corn was harvested before the rain, but only half the soybeans were harvested when the crop should have been nearly 80 percent complete.

“Total losses for row crops are expected to be around 23 percent of the potential value of the crop,” John Michael Riley, an agricultural economist with the Mississippi State University Extension Service, said. - Bonnie Coblentz, MSU Ag Communications

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