Good morning.
Bank heists? So overdone. But a cheese heist?! We’re dairy intrigued…
In the Netherlands last month, thieves made away with 3,500 pounds of cheese from a farm in Fijnaart—that’s 161 wheels of cheese, worth about $23,000, carried away in the middle of the night.
Bad news for the cheese bandits, though: Those wheels each have their own serial numbers (and the farm’s logo stamped on!), making them easy to track.
Read more about the "organized crime" of cheese heists—or should we say cottage industry?
Stories:
- Summer Ethanol for the Win
- The (Burger) King of Cattle & Climate
- China's Thorny Corn Situation
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Scott Olson | Getty Images
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Summer’s just around the corner, and you know what that means…
Swimming pools, barbecues, and more corn in your gas tank.
On Tuesday, President Biden made his way to an ethanol plant in Iowa and made a big announcement:
"I love corn. I just love it. We should use it more."
Okay… a bit paraphrased. Here’s what he actually said:
Presidential soundbite: "The [EPA] is planning to issue an emergency waiver to allow E15 gasoline, that uses more ethanol from homegrown crops, to be sold across the United States this summer in order to increase the fuel supply."
**And the ethanol crowd goes wild.**
Refresher: Citing smog concerns, the EPA currently does not allow E15 to be blended with gasoline during the summer months. Under the waiver, E15 blends will now be available June 1 through September 25.
As Biden made the announcement in the Corn Capital itself, you can bet the enthusiasm was corntagious.
The ethanol industry was quick to tout consumer cost savings. They also noted that current research pretty much concludes E15 doesn’t actually create more smog than year-round E10 blends.
But not everyone found the announcement to be so amaizeing. Some ethanol producers were less than impressed, stating this "short-term solution" should be converted into a true year-round E15 rule.
And of course, the petroleum industry wasn’t too excited.
Where this goes: As a plus, Biden's ethanol plan fits well with his environmental policy. But currently, E15 pumps and infrastructure is lacking. The solution? $100M rolling out soon that will "build a biofuel infrastructure of the future."
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→ India helping save the day. With ongoing worries about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine causing worldwide wheat shortages, a record 111M-tonne wheat harvest in India will help match import demand in Asia, Europe, and North Africa.
→ Going bananas. In Ecuador, banana growers blocked main roads across three provinces to call for government action on the low prices that are keeping them from breaking even.
→ One small step for… corn? NASA has mapped where corn is grown in the U.S., China, and France, thanks to special lasers mounted on the International Space Station—tech they hope will one day chart corn production worldwide.
→ The steaks are high. CEOs of the four major meatpacking companies in the U.S. will testify at an upcoming Congressional hearing about cattle markets, prices, and potentially anti-competitive behavior in the industry.
→ Frigid in Fargo. It’s North Dakota’s calving season, and a spring blizzard has dumped 12 to 20 inches of snow across the central portion of the state, although the hope is that the snow melt will create some relief from ongoing drought.
→ Carbon Count(s) the money. Australian startup Carbon Count has raised a USD $50M Series B funding round to further expand its platform, which helps farmers measure carbon in their soil, reduce paperwork to claim credits, and more.
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Burger King of Climate & Cattle |
When Burger King isn’t getting into Twitter wars with Wendy’s, they’re supporting cattle ranchers.
Whopper of a deal: Burger King, Cargill, and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) are teaming up to flip the script on climate change.
The five-year initiative that brings up to $5M in funding from Burger King and Cargill aims to support cattle ranchers who utilize regenerative agriculture practices. NFWF is upping the ante with a matching contribution—creating a $10M project.
Fries with that: The three entities plan to help encourage improved grassland management practices while reducing greenhouse gas emissions in Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas.
Make it a meal: The Southern Plains Grassland Program will work with organizations, associations, and local, state, and federal agencies to implement and monitor the progress of this program.
Its priorities and goals include:
- Improving grassland health and resilience through better grazing practices
- Control of invasive species that reduce available forage for livestock and habitat for wildlife
- Restoring formerly converted lands back to grassland
Innovation is the name of the game. The initiative will also look at ways to reimagine grass banks, grazing arrangements, water delivery, and fences.
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Grains: Corn surged on global tight supplies and beans had a solid day due to strength in oil markets.
Livestock: Sluggish exports and questions on demand kept the proteins mixed.
*As of Market Close [4/14/22]
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Say Goodbye to Analog Data |
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Just take it from one of their customers, Del Monte Foods field supervisor, Randy Peguignot:
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Discover all that CropTrak has to offer today.
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China: Stuck Between Corn and COVID |
China’s zero-COVID policy means zero corn for some farmers who have found themselves locked in and kept out of fields that need to be planted.
It shucks: Smallholder farmers often take winter jobs in cities, and many still remain stranded in those cities. Farmers in rural communities may not be allowed out, even to clear land from last year’s harvest or to buy seed and fertilizer. Meanwhile, movement restrictions have left farm store shelves empty.
Farmers in northeastern provinces were giving the government an earful about the situation on social media, which yielded a special transport arrangement to get growers back in the fields.
It’s just in the nick of time, as planting season begins at the end of April in China’s largest corn-growing province. Luckily, there’s no impact to corn yield from late planting... Oh wait.
By the numbers:
- China is the world’s number two corn producer and number one grain consumer
- Jilin province, where strict COVID policy remains in place, accounts for 10% of the nation’s cornfields
- Nearly 100,000 stranded farmers returned home by April 10th, but there’s no telling shelling how many may still be stuck in cities
Zoom out: Concerns are mounting that China may need to increase imports as they face a potential domestic grain shortage. The COVID-related challenges are just the most recent addition to a long list of issues farmers say will curb yields and put food security at risk. Among those are high fuel and fertilizer costs and strict rules against stubble burning.
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Below is a map of global output by country of one crop we’ve already mentioned somewhere above in today’s newsletter.
What crop is it?
Answer at the bottom of the email.
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Written & Edited by Kevin Cross, Sheridan Wimmer, Kelsey Faivre, Ashley Scoby, and Travis Martin
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