American Ag Today- 10/28/24

And welcome into a brand new episode of American Ag Today, produced by the American Ag Radio Network. I'm your host, Jesse Allen. Thanks for joining us here on the program. While U.S. farmers remain hopeful, the push for renewable diesel will open a large market for the vegetable oil pressed from soybeans. However, imported used cooking oil, particularly from China, has been supplanting that demand pull.

North Dakota State University agricultural economist, Fran Olson says this is because there are two different interacting policies. So the California Air Resources Board or CARB is actually really behind a lot of these decisions. And at least right now is from what I'm understanding of the kind of the driving force behind some of these uses for not only the used cooking oil, but also for other sources of vegetable oil.

There are two policy layers the California Air Resources Board or CARB and the federal RFS or Renewable Fuel Standard. CARB is quite literally in the driver's seat. Part of the reason that there's such an interest in the used cooking oil is because it is used cooking oil. So when you do the carbon math,

is my terminology for this. Because it's a waste product, they don't count the carbon that is going to be used other than the energy required to convert the used cooking oil into renewable diesel. So the carbon footprint for used cooking oil is substantially smaller than the carbon footprint for vegetable oil that's been

a viable feedstock and then converted because that used cooking oil has already been used for something else. Now the imported used cooking oil is considered a waste product. Its carbon footprint has already been assigned to the food industry. This is the characteristic that makes it valuable to oil companies. They get more California carbon policy bang for the buck from the used cooking oil than from processed soybean oil.

While many state milk producer associations spent a lot of time at the hearings on modernizing the federal milk marketing orders. One of those was the Minnesota Milk Producers Association. Lucas Sostrom, the executive director for MMPA, says they went to the hearings with specific goals in mind.

Yeah, so in my role with edge dairy farm or cooperative, I've been very involved, spent probably almost a month of the hearing down in Indiana. So we came with a principled approach. We wanted no negative PPDs so that people had incentive to pool. And I think we maybe lost sight of that during the hearing. People forgot that that was probably the reason for the hearing in a big way is why are we having these negative PPDs. We also wanted to sustain risk management, even for class one. All of us want fluid milk to grow. That's had a slow and steady decline. And so those firms that sell all fluid milk, they need risk management too.

And so we're a little weary and we have been of some of the changes proposed back to the higher of. Some good things came out of the hearings.

but we're very glad to see which we testified on the extended shelf life milk having a way to manage the risk for the first time or continued I should say and we hope that USDA looks at updating butter fat alongside protein because we think it'd be really weird to have a three four fat and three four protein someday but we're heading that direction right now and so we're hoping that they update both fat and protein alongside each other so that the CME and others work well for farmers understand so

Overall, I think we've got a decent recommendation. We would have done some things differently, but hopefully when we see the final recommendation, we can educate farmers as to how it affects them and affects the members of our cooperative. Once again, that is Lucas Sostrum from the Minnesota Milk Producers Association. Well, fast and furious. That's the way USDA describes this year's corded soybean harvest USDA meteorologist Brad Rippy has this forecast for the rest of the 2024 harvest.

It looks like we are going to wrap up this harvest earlier than normal. And he says there's good reason for that. We continue with open weather across much of the plains, the Midwest, the South. And with very few exceptions, we are rolling along very quickly on this autumn fieldwork season.

Ripley says the corn harvest is already 13% above average this time of year. Producers are starting to switch now from soybeans, which were mostly harvested early back to corn. And that has put the harvest number for corn up to 65% by the 20th of October. And it's the same story for soybeans with harvested 81% or 14% above average. One of the two US senators who are farmers, Iowa's Chuck Grassley, told Ag reporters

The grass leaves are just about done harvesting corn and pretty good crop. Now we'll get an updated crop progress report later on Monday afternoon. But as of last Monday's pace, again, 81% complete on soybean harvest with corn harvest, 65% complete. An industry report said the soybean harvest is moving along at its fastest pace in 14 years. The court harvest is moving at the fastest pace since 2021.

The quick harvest pace and crop size is putting a strain on physical storage capacities for many grain handlers. While grain merchants are racing to ship out a record large harvest ahead of the upcoming presidential election, Marine link says fears of renewed trade tensions with China at the top soybean importer are driving the push.

USDA data released earlier in the week says almost 2.5 million metric tons of US soybeans were inspected for export the previous week including almost 1.7 million tons headed to China the largest amount in the last year that was earlier last week

Prices are hovering near four-year lows, and if this heightened export demand doesn't last, that may leave the U.S. with a glut of oilseeds. Terror of threats are causing some Chinese importers to not take U.S. shipments from January 2025 onward. Buyers are said to be looking to Brazil's soybean crop instead, paying up to $0.40 a bushel more than they would in the U.S. in a quicker than expected seasonal shift that's shrinking the U.S. export window.

And also here today on the program for those who might not know, the National Grange is one of the oldest agricultural advocacy groups in America. The goal is to promote the economic and social well-being of farmers. It's only been a year since Chris Hamp was elected president of the National Grange, but in that time, she's worked hard to share with the farming community why the Grange is important in the 21st century.

Hamp notes that the Grange has several functions, including encouraging children and young adults to be individuals and advocate for themselves.

Long before the phrase, you know, it takes a village to raise a child was something that was part of our vernacular. It was what Grange did. And what it continues to do is make sure that our members are part of something bigger than themselves, that you grow and learn for a lifetime.

In a world where phones and electronic devices rule the lives of so many, what has the Grange done to stay relevant? Well, Hamp says they focus on rural America and how those needs greatly differ from the needs of those living in more metro areas.

that they have education and that they have health care and that they have connection to the ability to stay there and to farm a small farm if that's what they want to do. I think there's lots of issues out there that we can help make sure that

If you want to call rural America home and you want to raise a family on a small farm in a small community that we can make sure that that happens. And for more information on the National Grange, go to their website, nationalgrange.org. That's all the time for this episode of American Ag Today. I'm Jesse Allen. Have a great rest of your day.