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USDA forecasts all food costs this year will rise 2.3%, up from 2.2% in September, with grocery prices expected to climb by 1.2%, up from 1.1% last month. Restaurant prices are still forecast to rise 4.1%. For 2025, food costs are projected to increase 2.4%, with expected rises of 1.6% for grocery prices and 3.4% for restaurant prices. Beef prices are expected to rise 5.5% this year and 2.2% in 2025. Pork is forecast to increase 1.7% this year and 2.2% next year. Egg prices continue to show volatility, with 2024 costs projected to rise 8.8%. The 2025 egg price increase was revised even higher to 10.5%, a sharp jump from the 4.7% projected in September. USDA noted highly pathogenic avian influenza outbreaks have significantly reduced the U.S. egg-layer flock, contributing to the price surge.
Agriculture Secretary Julio Berdegué outlined plans to guarantee prices for corn farmers to stabilize tortilla prices, which have surged in recent years. The government aims to increase bean production by 30% over six years to reduce imports and plans to establish research centers for higher-yielding bean seeds. The plan also includes support for coffee production, focusing on instant coffee, which is reportedly used by 84% of Mexican households. Additionally, it seeks to bolster cocoa production for powdered baking and hot chocolate rather than fine chocolate bars.
Early indications are that Russia may harvest another disappointing wheat crop in 2025. SovEcon is forecasting 80.1 million tonnes of production, down from 81.5 million tonnes this year and the five-year average of 88.1 million tonnes. Total wheat area is forecast to remain unchanged at about 70 million acres, with winter wheat plantings down and spring acres up. Dry conditions are proving problematic for the winter crop. “Topsoil moisture reserves are very low and in many regions wheat is entering the winter in the worst shape in recent years,” SovEcon analyst Andrey Sizov said in an email. “This is likely to lead to a below-average winter wheat yield in 2025.”
The United States is eyeing new markets for its soybeans as China continues its shift to Brazilian beans. India is one up-and-coming market where the U.S. sees tremendous potential.
Poultry production is expanding by six per cent per year in the world’s most populated country, Lance Rezac, chair of the U.S. Soybean Export Council (USSEC), said during a recent webinar hosted by Agri-Pulse Communications. India appears to have enough domestic soybean production to meet the feed demand from that sector for the time being. However, there is no surplus production, and in years where the domestic crop is poor, India’s poultry sector has been forced to import soybean meal. Rezac thinks that will become a more common practice in the coming years due to the rapid growth in India’s poultry industry.
Deforestation is the second largest source of the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change after the burning of fossil fuels, according to the European Commission. The EU had planned to ban the import of commodities from suppliers unable to prove their goods were not linked to deforestation. The EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR) would have impacted imports of cocoa, coffee, cattle, soy, oil palm, timber, rubber and related products such as chocolate and leather. It was scheduled to come into effect Dec. 30, but the EU Commission recently proposed a 12-month delay, under pressure from industries and governments who said it would cause supply chain disruptions, exclude poor, small-scale farmers from the EU market and drive up the cost of basic foodstuffs because many farmers and suppliers were not ready to comply.
Brazil's environmental protection agency IBAMA has imposed 365 million reais ($64 million) in fines on cattle ranches and meat packers, including the world's largest JBS SA (JBSS3.SA), opens new tab, for raising or buying cattle on illegally deforested land in the Amazon. IBAMA said on it had identified 69 properties that had sold 18,000 head of cattle raised on deforested land, and 23 meat packing companies that bought the cattle in the states of Para and Amazonas.
World Farming Agriculture and Commodity news - Short update - 21st October 2024
Following heavy rain in much of Ivory Coast, pod counters and exporters are starting to lower their production forecasts for the main cocoa crop due to high flower and cherelle mortality after the October counts, they said Friday. Four pod counters and six exporters whose teams carry out monthly technical surveys on the growth of cherelles, the quantity of flowers on the tree trunks, the quantity of pods on the trees and the soil moisture content observed a worryingly low survival rate of cherelles and flowers in October compared to September and August.
China on Friday launched a five-year action plan to accelerate the digital transformation of the entire agriculture industry chain as part of measures to raise domestic food production.
The 2024-2028 smart agriculture action plan will aim to establish a digital planting technology scheme as well as a national agricultural and rural big data platform by 2028, the agriculture ministry said in a statement.
Today, the European Commission is taking further steps to support Member States affected by unprecedented climate-related disasters. As announced by European Commission President von der Leyen during her visit to Poland on 19 September 2024, the Commission is proposing amendments to three EU regulations to ensure that EU funds can be quickly mobilised in support of post-disaster recovery. The amendments concern the Regulations governing the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Cohesion Fund (CF), and the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+), for the 2021-2027 programming period, as well as the Regulation of the European Agricultural Fund for Rural Development (EAFRD) as part of the 2014–2022 framework. These proposals come as a direct response to the floods affecting Central and Eastern European countries and wildfires in Portugal in September 2024. The proposals taken together could allow the seven concerned Member States (Poland, Romania, Austria, Czechia, Hungary, Portugal, and Slovakia) to reprogramme around €18 billion (roughly €17.7 billion under the Cohesion Policy funds and €588 million under the EAFRD) to help in the context of climate-related disasters. These measures will ensure that the EU can flexibly support all Member States impacted by recent and potential future climate-related disasters.
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