USDA Releases Uneventful March WASDE

The USDA released its March World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report Tuesday morning.

 

Dan Basse is president of AgResource Company in Chicago.

 

"The March reports are usually one of the most boring of the year and this one didn't disappoint," he said. "If we look at U.S. corn, soybean and wheat ending stocks, they were exactly unchanged from February...and then if we look to the world numbers, the Argentinian number on soybeans was dropped a half million metric tons to 47.5 million metric tons. The Brazilian number was raised one million metric tons to 134 million. Looking around to Chinese demand or other crops around the world, nothing changed of substance and so the market here is really left with kind of what it had, which is trying to determine what South American crop sizes really are and then the veracity of Chinese demand going forward."

 

Basse says there are farmers in the southern United States looking at corn planting within the next two weeks, depending on the forecast.

Video: Season 6, Episode 12: Veterinarians’ Perspectives on Managing Swine Herd Health Across All Phases

Identifying challenges in swine production and turning them into solutions through research and team development is the focus of this episode. Dr. Christine Mainquist-Whigham of Pillen Family Farms and DNA Genetics shares insights on herd health, biosecurity and trial work to improve pig performance. She also discusses her team’s research philosophy, how they evaluate rate of investment and how they gather feedback from employees to address challenges and maintain herd health across all phases of production. Dr. Carlos Roudergue of Country View Family Farms discusses the growing complexity of swine production, especially as technology increases and employee interaction decreases. He also shares how their workforce is shifting toward more specialized roles to support herd health and efficiency.