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Just got hit upside the head by a 'wise olde owl' (no, not Ken - different 'wise olde owl'). One who is a forth generation farmer overseeing the running of a very large operation.

We were talking...

Here, it's being a groundwater recipient. Sanitary District water source for potable water, deep aquifer (about 1300 ft.) source. For around here, that's a deep well.

If I go east about 25-30...

Just spent the last two days getting my head bombarded with new research angles and areas of interest....

Graphene filters for water.
Graphene supercapacitors for energy storage.
Red wine...

It's starting up again....

Link to zerohedge.com on rice futures

Yes, it's the hedge funds gossip column, and it's full of spin, pitches, and probably outright falsehoods, but they have a...

was worried about grain prices back then, with Jan. 2008 beans and January, 2008 corn at prices I thought were outrageous back then. Well, 18 months later, guess where grain prices are today, and...

IMO, the marketplace is starting to tell us a story. The "known" part of the story is:

Link to Article

The part that is just being talked about hasn't been reported yet, because there's no...

Little bits and pieces floating around out there...

First Argentina. 3rd largest soybean producer in the world, Brazil is #2, US is #1. Both Argentina and Brazil are having drought issues,...

Link to Article

This one has really hit the news Link

This was not an anticipated purchase - It's pretty clear that Iranian marketplace options for hard wheat (right now) were pretty limited. ...

Article from Monsanto's annual meeting:


Link to Article

IF they can pull this off (and from what I'm hearing from talking to people in the community, they think it's likely, and it won't even...

From Foreign Policy article:


There's the real meat of the article. The pols didn't create restrictions on imports until AFTER the output started to expand. Vital point, there, that at least...

All sorts of little pieces out there, goings on..

The Philippines purchases rice through a national government body (NFA; National Food Authority) for imports. They just went out for a tender for...

Originally posted by Bourbon:


There's just way too much smart money out there for this to happen. Besides, the last time around where there was cascading oil prices worldwide, the whole ag...

over food shortages is a complete non-starter:



Link

Now, think of this "stupidity" from a political viewpoint here in the US (like in the Midwest). Explain to me exactly how you are going...

Originally posted by Bill Moore:


Don't see it happening. Certainly not with any high level of UN involvement. The whole UN "Oil For Food" program fiasco will immediately reappear in all it's...

Here's three charts of most recent numbers. There's some interesting information here:

The first chart is who consumes the most rice. No major surprises there:

Rice Consumption by Nation
...

Link to Information

Well, yes and no. A 1.8% worldwide growth in rice production is certainly better than what has occurred for the last several years, but not good enough. And remember, this is...

Originally posted by Stan:


You are probably quite correct, but tend to doubt that it goes anywhere, particularly after our experiences back in the 1960's and 1970's.

We used to have what you...

because the grain market seemingly is being driven by the negative news. And as a result, prices are going up.

As to Argentina, that's what has tended to occur in prior years. But Argentina has...

Link to article

Article is ok, but doesn't fill in the pieces behind the real story - which is, Why the Drop in Acreage devoted to corn production?

Looks to be a number of reasons:

01 Crop...

...that's interesting here:



Link to full article

Another viewpoint

There's a whole lot of "talk" going on about this one. First off, there's other recent "new" hedge funds charging into...

Here's the link to the FT story about the spike in rice prices today. The US is one of the few rice export markets that is still functioning as a free market.



Link to article

Another...

...and of all places, it's coming from (wait for it).... ETHIOPIA

Yep, that's right. Ethiopia.

They are (this month) opening the Ethiopia Commodity Exchange (Free market), primarily for grains...

...rice also. WSJ article dated 12.15-16.2007 (Pg. B1).

Unfortunately the article is not available to non-subscribers.

Then there's this (from a different source):

Link is Here

Originally posted by selil:


why (in part) the wheat harvest has been substandard the last two years - drought. But the corn harvest (beans, also) has been good the last 2 years, because no...

Originally posted by LawVol:


...that farmers are going to be able to vastly increase even more corn production. It's already happened (for the 2007 planting season; see below), and like the...