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Logan
Hawkes
03/19/08
Crop News Weekly
On the eve the vernal equinox, thoughts turn to
the spring season as the crop year once again prepares to get underway.
Planting has already begun in warmer regions, but late winter woes in
much of the Midwest promises to delay any quick seed deployment for some
time to come. None-the-less, preparations are well underway across the
nation as spring looms before us. In the news this week, the high stakes
poker game between Congress and the Bush administration over the farm
bill is enough to put the fear of the Almighty into even the most
hardened gambler. And the spectators who will be most affected by the
outcome, the nation’s farmers and ranchers, can do little but watch
and send representatives to offer opinions. Also this week, it's not
just the farm bill growers are concerned about. While the farm bill is
the foremost legislative concern, some are suggesting the recently
passed energy bill is more likely to have the bigger impact. In fact,
the Food and Agriculture Policy Research Institute (FAPRI) senior
economist says the effect of energy needs on agriculture already has
been huge. Elsewhere, ethanol may be losing some of its luster as a
renewable fuel — in part because of media attacks purporting to
portray the dark side of the alternative fuel’s impact on food prices.
But the U.S. ethanol industry produced 32 percent more of the corn-based
fuel in 2007 than in 2006, according to year-end data. Finally this
week, it’s one of the most asked questions among farmers this year:
How are we going to contend with high fertilizer prices?
Explore these stories and more in this issue of Crop News Weekly.
Happy reading - and happy spring.
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High
stakes on table in farm bill debate
The high stakes poker game between Congress and the
Bush administration over the farm bill is enough to put the fear of the
Almighty into even the most hardened gambler. And the spectators who
will be most affected by the outcome, the nation’s farmers and
ranchers, can do little but watch and send representatives to offer
opinions. “Defeat is not an option,” said Ted Higginbottom, a
Seminole, Texas, peanut farmer and chairman of the United Peanut
Alliance. Higginbottom offered an update on likely scenarios in this
debate that never ends during a recent Oklahoma Expo in Lone Wolf, Okla.
“I think representative Collin Peterson (chairman of the House
Agriculture Committee) and the secretary of agriculture will get
together and devise a bill that President Bush will sign,”
Higginbottom said. - Ron Smith
Farm Press Editorial Staff
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Economies,
the energy bill and impacts on agriculture
While the farm bill is the foremost legislative
concern among Southern farmers, Abner Womack says the recently passed
energy bill is more likely to have the bigger impact. In fact, the Food
and Agriculture Policy Research Institute (FAPRI) senior economist says
the effect of energy needs on agriculture already has been huge. Womack,
speaking at the LSU AgCenter-sponsored AgOutlook 2008 conference in
Monroe, La., pointed out several things about the figures and
predictions. - David Bennett, Farm Press Editorial Staff
|
Commodity
prices fuel acres battle
Planting season is just few months away, December 2009
cotton futures prices are hovering around 90 cents a pound and
cottonseed, soybean, corn and wheat prices are at record levels — no
wonder Mid-South farmers are giddy with excitement. But fertilizer,
fuel, chemical and seed costs are going up too, a recession looms and
shortages of soybean seed and storage are factors to consider when
deciding what to plant. Here’s what producers interviewed at the
Mid-South Farm and Gin Show had to say about the upcoming season. -
Elton Robinson, Farm Press Editorial Staff
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Ethanol
production continues to rise
Ethanol may be losing some of its luster as a
renewable fuel — in part because of media attacks purporting to
portray the dark side of the alternative fuel’s impact on food prices.
But the U.S. ethanol industry produced 32 percent more of the corn-based
fuel in 2007 than in 2006, according to year-end data recently released
by the U.S. Energy Department’s Energy Information Administration.
Capacity for ethanol production is expected to grow another 4 billion
gallons in 2008, despite shrinking margins for ethanol from
higher-priced corn feedstocks, according to the Renewable Fuels
Association. - Forrest Laws, Farm Press Editorial Staff
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Fertilizer
prices clouding corn outlook
It’s one of the most asked questions among farmers
this year: How are we going to contend with high fertilizer prices?
“Going back to 2004, fertilizer prices have just about doubled,”
says Glen Harris, University of Georgia Extension soil scientist. “And
it’s not the fault of your fertilizer dealer. There are a lot of
reasons for increased fertilizer prices, and we just have to deal with
them — you can’t make good corn without fertilizer.” When nitrogen
prices increased, it was blamed on natural gas, says Harris, and when
lime prices increased, it was blamed on freight costs. “In general,
everything is up because of supply and demand, and not just in the
United States but worldwide. The global population is growing and the
United States is a cheap market. If they can sell it somewhere else
globally, they will. China has 1.3 billion people and 55 percent of them
are farmers. There are 300 million people in the U.S. and about 2
percent of them are farmers,” he says. - Paul L. Hollis, Farm Press
Editorial Staff
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fields. For more information on Prefix herbicide, please visit www.prefix-herbicide.com.
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Sen.
Grassley gives new meaning to tenacity
No wonder Iowans keep sending Chuck Grassley back to
the U.S. Senate. Tough, tenacious, the five-term senator is everything
you would want the person representing your state to be. Grassley’s
payment limit amendments are a case in point. Along with North Dakota
Sen. Byron Dorgan, Grassley has introduced new payment rules five times
without getting the language enacted. But that hasn’t stopped him from
mounting one more effort. The Senate Budget Committee approved a fiscal
2009 budget resolution amendment to place a “hard” cap of $250,000
per person on farm program payments. Grassley and Colorado Sen. Wayne
Allard offered the language. - Forrest Laws, Farm Press Editorial
Staff
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Biofuels
drive FAPRI 10-year projections
Biofuels are a driving force in agriculture and will
continue to be, according to the Food and Agricultural Policy Research
Institute’s latest 10-year projections. “It’s hard to talk about a
baseline without saying something about biofuels,” said Scott Brown,
FAPRI livestock analyst during a March 5 press conference. “We’re
expecting in 2008 that ethanol production from corn to be nearly 11
billion gallons and continuing to grow to 15 billion gallons. The
recently passed legislation (by Congress mandating biofuel usage)
certainly has an effect on ethanol production long term.” However,
ethanol production is just one of the reasons why FAPRI — whose
reports are relied upon by Congress when crafting legislation — sees
crop prices “that have moved higher. When looking at the baseline, we
anticipate those will continue to (remain) higher. - David Bennett,
Farm Press Editorial Staff
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Plan
early for double-crop soybeans
Wheat acreage is up across the upper Southeast,
indicating an increase in double-crop soybeans in the 2008 season. By
making some critical management decisions now, growers can increase
their chances of a top crop this fall. In South Carolina some growers
have had great success growing early maturity group soybeans, but
drought, timing of harvest and other production practices are likely to
keep that trend on the decline. The vast majority of soybeans planted in
the state are likely to follow this year’s big wheat crop. It just
makes sense to double-crop beans behind wheat, says Clemson University
Agronomist Pawel Wiatrak. From an agronomic standpoint, full-season
beans will usually do better, but from a risk standpoint, having two
crops makes a lot more sense than depending on one, he adds. - Roy
Roberson, Farm Press Editorial Staff
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Harkin:
Farm bill complicated by Rangel illness
Just when it seemed the 2008 farm bill couldn’t get
any more complicated, word spread that House Ways and Means Committee
Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., had been hospitalized in New York with
the flu. Rangel’s illness comes during a critical time for the farm
bill negotiations because House and Senate Agriculture Committee leaders
and the White House are still wrangling (no pun intended) over how to
offset $10 billion in “over-baseline” funding that Sen. Tom Harkin
says is needed to pass the legislation. The 77-year-old New York
Democrat has been meeting with Harkin, chairman of the Senate
Agriculture Committee, House Ag Committee Chairman Collin Peterson and
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus to try to figure out how to
pay for the proposed funding increases in the farm bill. - Forrest
Laws
Farm Press Editorial Staff
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Specialty
crop industry: Farm bill missed opportunity
The Specialty Crop Farm Bill Alliance (SCFBA), a
national coalition of more than 120 specialty crop organizations
representing 350 specialty crops, calls the latest extension of the Farm
Bill a "missed opportunity" to enact federal farm policy that improves
nutrition for all Americans while injecting more competition into the
marketplace. Specialty crops account for nearly half of all cash crop
receipts in America. The Alliance urges Congressional leaders and the
Administration to finalize the details of the Farm Bill for a vote in
April. "Both the House and Senate versions of the Farm Bill make a
strong investment in specialty crops and their priorities. We believe
that this extension represents a missed opportunity to move agriculture
into the 21st Century and make federal farm policy more equitable for
all of agriculture. It is imperative that Congressional leaders and the
Administration continue working during this extension to craft
legislation that recognizes our priorities, including improving
nutrition, enhancing research capabilities, eradicating invasive pests
and diseases and increasing state competitiveness projects that focus on
food safety and increasing consumption of specialty crops."
|
The
A-Z of the technology changing agriculture
Agriculture is full of mind-spinning new products,
technology and trends that promise big changes for Midwest crop farmers.
The editors at Farm Industry News have pulled together an informal list
of the people, products, ideas and trends that may make your operation
more efficient and more profitable in the future. Check out “what's
new and what's next” to help you get ready for this new era of
high-stakes farming. - Karen McMahon and Jodie Wehrspann, The Farm
Industry News
|
Nitrogen
costs could hinder hay expansion
Despite unusually high prices for hay, don’t look
for a lot of new land to come into forages in the two major
forage-producing states of Kentucky and Tennessee, say Extension
personnel. “We have essentially no hay stocks thanks to the drought
and freeze of 2007,” says Gary Bates, University of Tennessee
Extension forage specialist. “Our cattlemen have been buying hay for
quite a long time.” Prices are high. Grass hay is routinely advertised
at $150 a ton and higher, with alfalfa hay at $200 a ton and up, he
says. “There certainly is some price incentive to increase hay
production, but the problem is the high fertilizer prices,” says
Bates. “Can you afford to push production as high as possible when
nitrogen costs two or three times as much as it has in the past? -
Chris Bickers, Contributing Writer
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High
prices aren't friendly to some elevators
Although rising grain prices are the source of great
excitement to many commodity producers, two industries could be crushed
by them. MARKET ANALYST Richard Brock says independent elevators could
be hurt financially as futures prices continue to rise. Livestock
production: Market analyst Richard Brock said during the Mid-South Farm
and Gin Show that as herds liquidate due to high feed costs, Midwest sow
prices have dropped from 44 cents a pound two months ago to 15 cents.
The herds that are liquidating are independently-owned units of
1,000-1,300 sows. “We’re seeing them drop like flies. It is ugly.”
Independent grain elevators unable to keep up with margin calls: “If
this keeps going, we may not have any left,” said Brock, who notes
that a bank recently sent a letter to a third of its independent grain
elevators denying additional lines of credit. The elevators’ “net
worth is negative with the spread on the basis, and banks are having to
draw a line in the sand somewhere. The elevators have to liquidate
positions.” - Elton Robinson, Farm Press Editorial Staff
|
Economist
sees big movement in economy
The global economy will strengthen after 2011 as
America enters what could be “an amazingly dynamic economic period, a
period unlike any ever experienced in world history,” said Bobby
Coats, an Extension agricultural policy analyst with the University of
Arkansas Division of Agriculture. “I surely thought we were going to
talk ourselves into a recession for a while,” he said. “Consumer
confidence is of utmost importance to domestic growth. I was afraid all
the doom and gloom discussions would erode consumer confidence to the
point consumers and businesses reduced spending and put the U.S. economy
in danger of slipping into a recession.” While a recession is
possible, Coats expects the next 18 months to show more domestic and
global strength than weakness because of financial stimulus packages,
continued worldwide growth and momentum. - Lamar James, Arkansas
Extension Specialist
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Check out the latest corn and soybean market advice from
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