Good morning.
Don’t mind us as we brag on our lil Job Board for a hot minute. Rumor has it that we successfully placed two candidates in the past month for two different companies.
So if you haven’t already, get your open roles posted ASAP. And if you’re on the job hunt, don’t forget to submit your resume here to be linked up with our partnering ag-specific
recruiters.
Jobz for dayz.
Stories:
- Deja Moo at Meat Plants
- The Catcher in the Fly
- Pistachio Companies Come Un-shelled
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Meat Plant Mayhem... Round 2?
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At meatpacking plants across the U.S., it’s starting to feel a little too much like deja moo…
Who could forget the early COVID outbreaks at meatpacking plants in 2020? Over the first two months of the pandemic, 22 plants closed. One report estimated 59,000 meatpacking employees tested positive: that was nearly 1 in 10 of the workforce.
Now, with surging cases of the Omicron variant, meat plants are starting to see a familiar uptick.
Staff shortages not all that rare: Cargill Inc has been operating at lower capacity at some of their plants, including one in Dodge City, Kansas making do with a "skeleton crew." To start 2022, out of the 30 counties with the largest beef production plants, COVID cases had increased over a 2-week period in 26 of them. Pork and poultry processors have been affected by post-holiday COVID surges. And the USDA has started replacing and shifting inspectors due to staff shortages.
Where’s the beef? (And pork, and chicken…): USDA estimated beef slaughter numbers last Friday were down 6% from 2021, to 112,000 cattle, while pig slaughter declined about 5%. Perdue Farms is limiting its production of certain poultry products.
While the situation isn’t yet as dire as it was in 2020 (that May, nearly one-fifth of Wendy’s restaurants were out of beef…), potential shortages could loom if meatpacking plants don’t wrangle these outbreaks.
Soundbite: "We are seeing case counts ebb and flow as communities work to manage the spread of the COVID-19, especially the Omicron variant," noted Cargill, Inc. spokesman Daniel Sullivan
The steaks are high: Demand for meat is still skyrocketing, which makes it even worse timing to have another decline in slaughter capacity. The longer a slowdown continues, the more likely prices will increase. And with inflation already going hog-wild, that’s bad news for consumers.
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→ The Wolf of Carbon Street. ADM and Wolf Carbon Solutions have partnered to build a 350-mile steel line capable of moving 12M tons of CO2 in an effort to ‘decarbonize’ ADM’s ethanol plants.
→ Regenerative financing? Farmers Business Network and Environmental Defense Fund launched a new finance fund that rewards farmers with lower rates and fees when they meet soil health and nitrogen efficiency standards.
→ Land trade tech notches $40M. AcreTrader, the startup platform connecting farmers and investors so they can buy and sell land smarter, announced its Series B funding.
→ Hormel on the hot seat. A shareholder activist group is pressuring the meat company’s Board of Directors to begin reporting what it deems are the external and public health costs of antibiotics used in meat.
→ Blending mandate rumor mill. The Biden administration is considering cutting the 2022 ethanol blending mandate below the 15B gallon mark, as the oil lobby and unions argue the ethanol industry can’t supply the target.
→ A $16B bill for China. Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack is assuring farmers and ranchers that the U.S. will push China to make up its $16B purchase shortfall from Phase One of their trade agreement.
→ USDA gets climate-smart. The department will invest $9M to boost climate research while also sharing climate-smart solutions directly with the agriculture community.
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Houston, we have a pest problem.
According to the Agricultural Research Service, damages to agriculture by insects exceed $100B each year and account for an annual 40% loss of ag production worldwide. Small creatures, mighty damaging.
Working out the bugs: FarmSense is a startup based in California trying to help solve the pesty…we mean, pesky problem. They use smart traps in fields that use optical sensor technology to automate the process of real-time insect classification and
counting.
Taking flight: FarmSense uses a sensor with light curtains inside a tunnel that attracts insects. Based on shadows and audio, the machine learning algorithms analyze the data. Once a trap detects an insect, it sends the information straight to the FarmSense cloud. With service that fast, farmers can monitor their pest problems immediately to help improve yields and optimize the use of pesticides.
Thank you very moth: The company was just awarded $2.2M to continue research on the impacts of invasive species like Japanese Beetles and Gypsy Moths. They’re planning to publicly launch the innovation this year and will focus on the Navel Orangeworm, which love feasting on pistachios, almonds, and citrus.
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Grains: Solid South American weather forecasts plus unexciting USDA reports on Wednesday pushed grains off a cliff.
Livestock: Slaughter issues (read Meat Plant Mayhem above) contributed to the ding in pigs while cattle were up on rumors that market is oversold.
*As of Market Close [1/13/22]
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California's Pistachio Clash-io
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George Rose / Getty Images
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The plot is thickening in an ongoing battle between rival nut companies, with Touchstone Pistachios gaining a recent foothold against Wonderful Pistachios.
In a nutshell: Touchstone Pistachios has been planning an efficiency expansion of a processing facility in Tulare County, California, and a new 49-silo plant in Fresno County. Both plans have been on hold due to environmental challenges from nut rival Wonderful Pistachios.
The expansions would support increasing nut production in the Valley. Growers are planting 30,000 acres of new pistachio trees each year, meaning nut production will continue to rise for years.
Feeling salty: A county judge ruled against Wonderful Pistachios on the Tulare County expansion. The judge called out Wonderful’s intent as, well, not so wonderful: that of an economic competitor rather than a party concerned with public duty. In other words, using environmental laws to stifle competition.
Soundbite: "Wonderful’s interests are not akin to individual residence owners challenging development of a condominium complex in the immediate vicinity of their neighborhood," said Judge Bret Hillman.
Where this goes: Four years in and counting, the embattled competitors will probably continue to duke it out. This nutty David and Goliath-style story is bound to have a few more chapters as the Fresno County expansion is still on hold.
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While the pistachio war in California might catch the attention of North American readers, there is one other country in the world that slightly ekes past the U.S. in production of this cashew family nut.
Which country below produces more pistachios (via 2019 data) than the U.S.?
Answer at the bottom of the email.
**Win a Magnetic koozie when you submit a trivia question and it gets used in a future newsletter.
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Why are you keeping us a secret? Make sure to share Magnetic with friends, family, and coworkers to snag Magnetic goodies when you hit certain referral counts.
Your link:
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Written by Ashley Scoby, Sheridan Wimmer, Kelsey Faivre, and Travis Martin
Edited by Ashley Scoby
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