Large Stocks Heighten the Importance of Ag Trade- Focus on China, Mexico

“In the United States, farmers facing a fourth straight year of declining incomes and rising debts are hanging on to grain in the hope of higher prices later. They may be waiting a long time: Market fundamentals appear to be weakening as the world’s top grain producers ponder what to do with so much food.” Meanwhile, Benjamin Parkin reported on Tuesday at The Wall Street Journal Online that, “Soybean futures touched a one-year low during trading Tuesday as big South American crops exacerbate worries about the competitiveness of U.S. exports. “The U.S. Department of Agriculture on Tuesday raised its forecast for Brazil’s record soybean harvest. The monthly report showed already large grain and oilseed surpluses rising across the world growing even bigger.” The Journal article added that, “The forecasts sent soybean prices, which have already fallen for much of this year, to a new low. Economists said the slide was raising pressure on the struggling U.S. agricultural economy, where many farmers have been forced deeper into debt or out of business by a multiyear slump.”