Yes, I noticed that. They have done very well in recent years. I might not have made it clear, but my only point was regarding the 2021 harvest.
Dry Corn Belt Ahead Of Pollination May Spell Disaster For Farmers
by Tyler Durden
Thursday, Jul 08, 2021 - 05:20 PM
ZeroHedge
ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zerowww.zerohedge.com
Kirk Hinz, a meteorologist with BAMWX, published an agriculture note Thursday which outlines "persisting rains" in some parts of the Southwest but "expanding dryness" in the north.
Hinz concentrates on the corn belt, which spans the Midwest. He said, "expanding drought into a crucial time of the year ahead of pollination." This means that persistent dry conditions could affect pollination success - and if pollination is not successful this year because of drought and lack of water, then harvest yields this season could come under pressure.
"A lack of consistent rainfall across a big chunk of the US major corn production areas in the Midwest and northern Plains this year continues, with the expanding drought into a crucial time of the year ahead of pollination as well. Weather models have remained volatile recently in regards to how much of these major production areas will receive timely rainfall, but the trend recently has been to push previously forecast widespread nourishing rains further south that's starting to be a growing concern (plus more heat building back in a mid-to-late month) ahead," Hinz wrote.
Here's what happens to corn if pollination is unsuccessful.
Here's the US Drought Monitor, which shows much of the Western US is in some form of drought.
Some rain relief was seen in the week ending June 6, but worsening conditions continue in the corn belt (or Midwest area).
For the four weeks ending June 6, rains increased in west Texas and east New Mexico but expanding dryness in the corn belt.
Over the last two months ending June 6, significant increases in precipitation have been seen from Texas to New Mexico up into Colorado. However, most of the corn belt continues to experience worsening droughts.
Despite improving conditions in the Southwest, the corn belt remains in a drought during the most crucial time of the year for corn development. If pollination becomes an issue, harvests could suffer across the corn belt. That would mean corn prices would remain elevated.
If you’ve eaten sushi anywhere in the U.S., chances are the rice came from California’s Sacramento Valley. Fritz Durst, a sixth-generation farmer, has grown the grain and other crops there for more than four decades. But this year, amid a historic drought, Durst is planting only half as many acres of rice as usual.
Farmers like Durst would be having an even worse year if it weren’t for water siphoned from the Sacramento River to irrigate fields. Those diversions, though, have dire consequences for another part of the sushi supply chain: The salmon industry. Low water levels and scorching weather have raised river temperatures so much that almost all the juveniles of an endangered salmon species could be cooked to death this fall, state wildlife officials have said.
Fritz Durst has grown rice and other crops on his farm in Yolo County, California for more than four decades. Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
The drought is so extreme that California regulators earlier this month voted to restrict river diversions for some farmers to protect drinking water supplies. But that’s unlikely to end to water-rights disputes between farms and fisheries, which have tussled in court for decades. As hotter and drier weather drains reservoirs and withers crops, the fight is growing even more fierce, underscoring how climate change is pitting multibillion-dollar industries around the world against one another in a battle for increasingly scarce resources.
“We should be shifting our focus from thinking about drought as an emergency that occurs once in a while, to thinking about it in the context of a long-term shift,” said Jeanine Jones, interstate resources manager at the California Department of Water Resources.
In California, the agriculture industry’s massive water consumption has long been a sticking point for fisheries, environmental groups and other stakeholders. Farms use about 40% of the state’s water on average, according to the nonprofit research group Public Policy Institute of California.
Water rights in California are governed by a complex system that dates back to the Gold-Rush era. Senior rights holders -- companies, farmers and cities with claims that were acquired before 1914, and landowners whose property borders a river -- are the last to see their supplies curtailed. They wouldn’t be affected by the measures approved earlier this month to restrict flows to some farmers.
Durst maintains a water well on his farm in Yolo County, California. Photographer: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
Competition for water isn’t unique to California, however. In Brazil, the Parana River Basin is experiencing its worst water crisis in 91 years, leaving farmers dependent on the river to vie with hydropower plants that provide electricity and water to the country’s industrialized south.
Rice, typically cultivated in flooded fields, is among the world’s most water-intensive crops. Government data reveals the toll drought is having on California’s rice growers, which generate more than $5 billion and 25,000 jobs for the state annually, according to the industry-funded California Rice Commission. In a typical year, the state accounts for about two-thirds of U.S. production of medium- and short-grain rice, the kind used in sushi. By late June, California plantings were 19% below year-earlier levels and the smallest in almost three decades, a U.S. Department of Agriculture report showed.
Lower output will likely translate to higher prices consumers. California farmers can expect to get $22 per 100 pounds of of medium- and short-grain rice for 2021-2022, the most in 13 years, the USDA said.
Tony Gentile, co-owner of Flagship Restaurant Group, which owns 16 sushi bars in six states, said the company has raised menu prices across all of its restaurants in recent weeks as rice and seafood become more expensive and labor costs climb. Though Flagship uses California rice, it’s considering sourcing the grain from Japan or other markets outside the U.S., Gentile said.
“Prices now fluctuate day to day more than any other time that I can remember, and I have been in the restaurant business for more than 20 years. It’s scary,” he said.
Rice isn’t the only crop decimated by drought, of course. Dry conditions have had a devastating impact across California’s agriculture industry, which supplies over a third of U.S. vegetables and two-thirds of its fruit. After years of what seems like permanent drought, farmers have started ripping out almond trees, which are typically a 25-year investment.
Scarce Salmon
Fisheries and some environmental groups argue that the drought’s impact on salmon has been even more severe, however. Young salmon are typically released from hatcheries into rivers, where they make their way into the Pacific Ocean. But water temperatures in some rivers have climbed so high that state officials are trucking the fish to cooler areas until conditions improve. Commercial and recreational ocean salmon fishing contributes more than $900 million each year to California’s economy, according to the state’s Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Thousands of young fingerling Chinook salmon are released into a holding pen as they are transferred from a truck into the Mare Island Strait in Vallejo,
California, on May 11.Photographer: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
Hot weather and water diversion for agriculture is putting commercial fisheries at risk, said Jon Rosenfield, a senior scientist at environmental group San Francisco Baykeeper.
“Cities like San Francisco and Oakland were once major West Coast fishing ports, but as we’ve diverted water from our rivers and destroyed fish nursery habitats in the rivers and the bay, those fisheries have collapsed,” Rosenfield said.
No Crabs, No Scallops: Seafood Is Vanishing From Menus in U.S.
A previous collapse of the salmon population in 2008 forced fisheries to close in droves. With her income gone, Sarah Bates, who’s been fishing in the San Francisco Bay Area for 15 years, took a desk job temporarily. Some of her peers went into the construction industry and stayed there, she said.
In a good year, Bates catches 300,000 to 500,000 salmon and sells them at $13 a pound. But the thought of fisheries closing again “keeps me up at night,” she said.
Changes by the Trump administration to limit the scope of protections under the Endangered Species Act could further heighten risks to the salmon population, environmental groups say. The Biden administration is reviewing the revisions.
Lockdowns, panic buying, low supply: Beef prices surge to unprecedented levels
Lockdowns, panic buying, low supply: Beef prices surge to unprecedented levels
As Beef Central's home page dashboard graph shows, quotes for 90CL cow meat destined for the US market have hit a 20-month high, reported on Friday at 825.6c/kg in Aussie currency terms. That's up another 34c/kg over the past month, and continues...www.sott.net
Jon Condon
Beef Central
Wed, 25 Aug 2021 16:44 UTC
AUSTRALIAN beef exporters are riding a surge in demand and price for lean manufacturing beef - most typically used to produce hamburgers.
As Beef Central's home page dashboard graph shows, quotes for 90CL cow meat destined for the US market have hit a 20-month high, reported on Friday at 825.6c/kg in Aussie currency terms. That's up another 34c/kg over the past month, and continues an almost unbroken price rise sequence since the start of the year.
It's part of the reason why some export processor grids are currently offering an unprecedented 655c/kg carcase weight for heavy cows in Queensland, and as much as 680c/kg in southern states.
Trade sources spoken to for this report suggest that similar equivalent prices are being seen for meat trade into other trim markets, especially Japan, Korea and China.
One contact quoted the market yesterday for export 90s as high as 805c/kg (FAS terms), with an additional 35c/kg freight, equating to 840c/kg (A$ CIF).
As can be seen on the 2020-2021 graph published above, the current lean trim price exceeds the sharp spike seen in mid to late May last year (blue line), when up to 40 percent of US beef processing capacity was knocked-out for several weeks due to COVID-related plant closures, or severe operating restrictions. This caused some panic trim buying from overseas.
Comment: The food waste that has been occurring due to the rolling and endless lockdowns has been particularly shocking, however the knock on effects may be even more severe with farms going out of business or restructuring to avoid further losses.
The only time export grinding beef prices have exceeded current levels was another brief 'spike' witnessed in late 2019, when Chinese buyers reacted dramatically to protein shortages brought on by a second wave of African Swine Fever sickness in China's domestic pig herd.
Comment: African Swine Fever hasn't gone away and instead a new outbreak was reported in South Korea, bringing their total cull to 450,000 pigs, since it was first identified in the country in 2019.
Note also that the last record spike was only two years ago, meaning that these spikes may be occurring with an increasing frequency.
"All manufacturing beef export markets are particularly strong at present," an experienced export trader told Beef Central yesterday.
"Demand on beef has been very, very solid in the US and other markets recently. In fact it's just continued to go up, and up. The cutout value on domestic USDA Choice and Select cattle has just continued to roar north, and Australian grinding beef is being dragged along for the ride," he said.
"Essentially, where that benefits us (Aussie exporters), is that all of those mid-range primals like a cap-on topside or a chuck roll are getting dearer, so the trade in the US is no long consigning them to the mincer, to supplement ground beef supply. They are simply too expensive to mince, and that's being reflected in prices for imported lean trim."
Comment: If beef is becoming too expensive to mince, what will producers use for burgers? Perhaps the USDA's recent reclassification of 'pink slime' as 'ground beef' provides the answer.
"That's happening despite pretty strong cow kills in the US, due to encroaching drought. And there is no sign this trend will come off in a big rush. There might be some small ebbs and flows, but we are getting towards the end of the northern hemisphere grilling season."
"The spot market for manufacturing beef in the US has actually been lower than the out-front market, and it's purely because they keep looking at our kills, and how much of our meat is not going there - at the same time as the NZ cow season is more or less done."
"There's been a little more South and Central American beef entering the US to compensate - but it hasn't made up the shortfall."
Japan trade in manufacturing beef 'continued to be busy,' the trader said, and the nature of the Japan trade had changed somewhat.
"It used to be that you could never trade trim into Japan at anything leaner than 85CL, but there's a lot of 90s and 93s sold into Japan out of both New Zealand and Australia this year."
"Mince is not necessarily a big item in retail in Japan, like it is in Australia or the US - but there is a lot of ground beef sold at food service level in Japan."
A number of factors are evidently in play in driving grinding beef prices higher this year, exporters say. Here's a quick summary:
Japanese competition
Competition among export customers is playing a part.
One of the real growth markets for Australian manufacturing beef in the past 12 months has been Japan. While the US has traditionally been Australia's largest frozen trim customer, Japan is currently our biggest frozen manufacturing beef market, in volume terms.
Using frozen boneless exports as a proxy for trim (virtually no trim is exported in chilled form), volumes into Japan have moved sharply higher this year, in both percentage and outright terms. Comparing July exports with the same period last year, frozen boneless volume to Japan has lifted from 58pc of total beef trade in 2020, to 63pc this year. Outright July frozen boneless volumes have gone from 12,146t in 2020, to 15,175t this year.
Some export traders have concluded that there is some 'down-trading' going on, with difficult financial conditions in Japan prompting some customers to move form more expensive muscle meat, to hamburger beef (known in Japan as 'hamburg steak,' or Hanbagu - see image.)
Exchange rate
Currency is playing a part in current pricing, when measured in A$ terms. The A$ today is valued at US72.5c, but has traded in the 71's for most of the past week. Just two months ago, it was worth close to US76c, heightening current pricing, when measured in A$ terms. At the start of the year, the A$ was still worth around US77c, declining about 7pc since then.
South American competition
The increase in South American beef exports to China continues to limit the amount of South American beef heading to the US. That's happening despite the sharply higher lean beef prices in the US market. Market adjustments since the withdrawal of Argentina from the export market in May and June has seen Brazil push more product into China, and relatively less into the US. Brazilian beef exports to China in July were the second highest monthly figure on record, at 91,143t. For the same reason, Uruguayan beef exports to China were up another 4500t in July.
Comment: China is also importing significant amounts of produce from the US: US facing significant meat shortages caused by the lockdown while it's increasing pork exports to China
Tight cattle supply
Continued tight supply out of Australia is also influencing price. Barely three million Australian cattle were slaughtered in the first six months of 2021, and numbers will rise to only around 3.4 million in the second half, MLA forecast recently - amounting to what promises to be the lowest calendar year kill in 35 years.
Softer New Zealand competition
New Zealand slaughter is expected to remain limited for the next couple of months, probably running at about 26-27,000 head per week, one analyst predicted recently. More favourable duty rates than Australia's are also seeing NZ favour China trade over the US. Further compounding the lack of product availability from New Zealand is the fact that China demand is expected to remain strong due to less product availability from Australia and Argentina.
Strong domestic beef demand
Another factor in current high manufacturing beef prices is the continued strength being seen in the domestic Australian beef market - both at retail, and in the recovering food service sector (perhaps NSW excepted).
MLA's weekly Steiner report last week suggested limited offerings from Oceania (Australian and New Zealand) and increased interest from domestic US end-users had caused imported prices to incrementally improve during the course of the week.
"Lean beef prices remain firm as market participants remain concerned about product availability in the fourth quarter," Steiner said.
"Interesting to see US media reports quoting a major restaurant chain that they expect significant price inflation in the US protein space for the remainder of the year."
"But while high prices are clearly top of mind for many US buyers, so is availability. Packers have struggled to fill order due to labour bottlenecks. Wholesale beef prices have spiked in the last three weeks, due to end-users getting shorted in their deliveries and having to go procure additional production the spot market."
Comment: Whether it be avoidable and man-made crises or natural disasters and outbreaks, it seems the food supply as a whole, not just beef, is under threat, with even major suppliers warning of probable food shortages to occur starting this year. As we can see above and in the links below, for some, they've already started; they've just yet to bite:
www.agriland.ie
www.overdriveonline.com
www.theweathernetwork.com
Dry April heightens drought fears for farmers - Farmers Weekly
A dry April has raised concerns the UK could be headed for a drought and left farmers desperate for rain to soak parched crops and grassland. April haswww.fwi.co.uk
Dry April heightens drought fears for farmers
© Tim Scrivener
A dry April has raised concerns the UK could be headed for a drought and left farmers desperate for rain to soak parched crops and grassland.
April has been notably dry, with only around half the normal amount of rainfall in England and Wales.
The outlook is for the month to finish with a mostly dry week, but any chances of significant rainfall do not look likely for some time.
See also: So you want to… build a reservoir?
Farmers across the UK need a spell of wet weather to help wash in fertiliser that has been applied in recent weeks at great cost, owing to soaring input prices.
“The weather is just so contrary these days,” said Guy Smith, who farms 350ha in St Osyth, Essex, the driest part of the UK on average.
“In this patch of Essex, having struggled with too much rain in the autumn and not getting crops established, we seem to be straight into the spring drought.
“Spring drilling was done in reasonably good conditions. Some crops are up nicely, but others on less than decent seedbeds are now really struggling.”
Fertiliser ‘sat on top of ground’
Having just applied expensive fertiliser, and then to see it sitting on the top of the ground and not doing anything due to a lack of rainfall was “all a bit frustrating”, said Mr Smith.
He continued: “As the old saying goes, ‘a wind from the East is no good for man nor beast’ – and that’s exactly what we have got. We need south-westerly breezes.”
But Mr Smith remains hopeful that showers in May will come to rescue the situation and avert a crisis.
“I’m not getting too down in the mouth yet,” he said. I’m hopeful the weather will come right for farmers.”
Explore moreKnow How
Visit our Know How centre for practical farming advice
In Norfolk, arable farmer Kit Papworth posted a photo on his Twitter page of him irrigating cereal crops. He said: “Sign of the times. Irrigating cereals in April.”
Rob Gardner, farm manager at Manor Farm in Upton Grey, near Basingstoke, Hampshire said spring crops, including peas, beans and wheat had emerged well, but now needed rain.
“It’s becoming a worry. If we get rain in the next week, we’ll all be very happy,” he said. “If it stays dry over the next two to three weeks, it will start to have more of an impact on the spring crops than the winter crops.”
‘Not critical yet’
Dairy farmer David Christensen manages 950 milking cows across two units in Oxfordshire, where he farms around 600ha, including 132ha of maize.
Mr Christensen said he was feeling “cautiously nervous” about the lack of rainfall. “It’s been a dry winter, followed by a dry spring and it’s very dry around the farm,” he said.
“If we get an inch or so of rain in the next fortnight, the situation could change markedly. But there’s no sign of that.
“It’s not critical yet, but it will soon be unless we get some rain over the next two to three weeks.”
Mr Christensen is not too concerned about his silage, as he expects to take his first cut in mid-May of grass grown on heavy land. However, he has established a lot of maize in the past week, which “now needs a drink”.
Dry May forecast
According to the Met Office, most of the UK has had lower than average rainfall this month, although northern Scotland has been wetter than average.
Its long-range forecast predicts that start of May will be dry, with cold nights and frosty mornings possible in rural areas. “A few showers are likely at times particularly for the North and East, where they could be heavy,” it says.
Dry, settled weather is forecast for much of the UK from mid- to end of May, with a chance of showers in places, but a lower risk of prolonged rain.
