Wheat Industry News
Recent news and highlights from around the U.S. wheat industry.
Speaking of Wheat. “Wheat, and especially grain, have become valuable sources of foreign capital in a sanctions-hit economy. Some even anticipate Russian grain becoming the Kremlin’s new oil — a commodity through which to keep some countries dependent on its resources — or to at least open doors to others.” – Nastassia Astrasheuskaya, author of a Sept. 9, 2021, article in Financial Times.
Rail Merger Announced. Kansas City Southern (KCS) railroad and Canadian Pacific (CP) Rail announced on Sept. 16 they have entered into a merger agreement, under which CP has agreed to acquire KCS in a stock and cash transaction. This would create the first single-rail network serving Canada, the United States and Mexico. In a release, CP stated that “the U.S. Surface Transportation Board review of CP’s proposed control of KCS is expected to be completed in the second half of 2022. Upon obtaining control approval, the two companies will be integrated fully over the ensuing three years.” Read the CP announcement here.
Influencing Future Crops. The U.S. National Science Foundation is working to find “better ways for people to monitor what crop plants need,” noted an article in AgriPulse. It is one goal of a research center dubbed CROPPS (Center for Research on Programmable Plant Systems) focused on the new field of digital biology. The National Science Foundation has funded the center at Cornell University where researchers at the University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign and the University of Arizona will use a multidisciplinary approach to develop tools to generate new data to help breed plants that can reach their full production potential under variable growing conditions.
Why Was Boris Johnson Wearing Wheat on His Lapel? The British Prime Minister, members of the British Parliament recently wore wheat heads as a symbol honoring British farmers and the United Kingdom’s food production. The British National Farmers’ Union (NFU) created the symbol to improve awareness for local farming by celebrating “Back British Farming Day.” U.S. Wheat Associates (USW) honors wheat farmers around the world who provide healthy, wholesome food every day.
U.S. Wheat Associates Publishes Commercial Sales every Thursday, documenting wheat export sales-to-date by country and class for the current marketing year compared to the previous marketing year on the same date. The report includes a 10-year commercial sales history by class and country. Data is sourced from the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service Weekly Export Sales Report. Read the latest report on the USW website.
Subscribe to USW Reports. USW publishes various reports and content that are available to subscribe to, including a bi-weekly newsletter highlighting recent Wheat Letter blog posts, the weekly Price Report and the weekly Harvest Report (available May to October). Subscribe here.
Follow USW Online. Visit our Facebook page for the latest updates, photos and discussions of what is going on in the world of wheat. Also, find breaking news on Twitter, video stories on Vimeo and more on LinkedIn.
