Ag Insight

BY JIM ERICKSON

War in Ukraine cuts wheat production; Canadian output predicted higher

Ukraine wheat production for marketing year (MY) 2022/23 is estimated at 19.5 million metric tons, down 9% from last month, and down 41% from last year. USDA crop production estimates for Ukraine include estimated output from Crimea. Yield is estimated at 3.71 tons per hectare, down 1% from last month and 17% from last year. Harvested area is estimated at 5.3 million hectares, down 10% from last month and 29% from last year.

USDA forecasts Canada wheat production for marketing year 2022/23 at 34.0 million metric tons (mmt), up 1.0 mmt or 3% from last month, 57% over last year and 12% above the 5-year average. Harvested area is estimated at 10.0 million hectares, up 3% from last month, 8% from last year, and 5% above the 5-year average. Yield is forecast at 3.40 metric tons per hectare, unchanged from last month and up 45% over last year. .

War also has impact on fertilizer prices

Global fertilizer prices are at near record levels and may remain elevated throughout 2022 and beyond. Fertilizer accounts for nearly one-fifth of U.S. farm cash costs, with an even greater share for corn and wheat producers. Fertilizer accounts for 36% of a farmer's operating costs for corn, and 35% for wheat. These elevated prices could have implications for crop production in 2022 and 2023.

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has exacerbated the already limited fertilizer supply situation and has triggered import-export restrictions that will compound shortage concerns.

The United States is a significant producer of nitrogen and phosphorus yet imports large quantities of potassium-based fertilizers. Although fertilizer prices began increasing in 2021, many U.S. producers were able to avoid the later surge in prices caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, because fertilizers for 2022 were purchased in 2021.

However, as the Russia-Ukraine war continues, the impact of fertilizer prices could likely take a heavier toll on 2023 agricultural production decisions, domestically and abroad. Current fertilizer price increases are reminiscent of the Great Recession period when prices nearly doubled across all major fertilizer

groups at the end of 2007. At that time, fertilizer prices were fueled by rising demand in many emerging markets, increased use of corn and other crops for biofuel production in the United States, Brazil, and Europe, the surge in energy prices, and Chinese fertilizer export tariffs.

However, fertilizer price increases during the Great Recession were short-lived once the demand for fertilizer fell, due to a decline in global agricultural trade coupled with slowing economic growth and low commodity prices.

Much like the period of the Great Recession, similar issues have fueled higher fertilizer prices in 2022. Global fertilizer demand remains strong. Some countries have reduced their fertilizer use since 2007, but many have continued to increase their crop nutrient use.

While the United States’ share of global fertilizer demand has dropped from 20% to 10% since 2007, many of the emerging markets have stepped up their use of fertilizers.

Land-grant research targets farm health, safety issues

Agriculture is one of the most hazardous industries in the U.S. Across the nation, people who work or live on farms and ranches are regularly exposed to dangerous machinery, sharp tools, toxic chemicals, biological pathogens, confined spaces, extreme temperatures and other hazards that can cause injuries or deaths. These injuries and deaths can have a ripple effect on the economic and social wellbeing of their communities.

However, land-grant universities are addressing agricultural health and safety issues. Researchers, educators, government and industry have made farms and ranches safer, but improvement is still needed.

Since 2000, a committee of experts at landgrant universities across the U.S. has worked to pinpoint the knowledge, outreach, engineering, and legislation needed to prevent work-related injury, illness, and death. Diverse expertise enables the committee to tackle a wide range of risks from multiple angles.

New use for brewer’s yeast has environmental benefits

Brewer's yeast used to make beer is typically discarded once it's no longer needed. Sometimes, though, the leftover yeast is mixed into livestock feed as a source of protein and vitamins.

Now, there may be even more reason to continue this practice, according to findings by a team of scientists with the Agricultural Research Service (ARS), Warren Wilson College (WWC), and Asheville Sustainability Research (ASR), LLC of Asheville, North Carolina.

Laboratory results the team published in the journal Frontiers in Animal Science suggest that using leftover brewer's yeast as a feed additive may benefit the environment by helping cows belch less methane into the air as a greenhouse gas that contributes to global climate change.

Agriculture accounts for 11% of all U.S. greenhouse gas emissions (5,981 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent), with ruminant animals including cows responsible for more than a quarter of that total.

Ag R&D spending on downward trend

In the United States, public agricultural research and development (R&D), which includes any agricultural R&D conducted at universities or government laboratories regardless of funding source, is supported through federal-state partnerships.

These partnerships provide an important complement to business R&D, providing scientific and technological innovations that raise U.S. agri-food system productivity.

This public R&D investment is the primary driver of long-term productivity growth in U.S. agriculture. In addition to increasing farm productivity, public agricultural R&D investment also supports improvements in natural resources and forestry management, helps advance rural development, enhances food safety and quality, and informs markets and policy.

Research supported by the USDA, Economic Research Service (ERS) has found spending on public agricultural R&D from 1900 to 2011 generated, on average, $20 in benefits to the U.S. economy for every $1 of spending.

However, this spending has been trending downwards. In 2019 (the last year for which complete statistics are available), public agricultural R&D spending in the United States totaled $5.16 billion, about a third lower than the peak in 2002 when spending was $7.64 billion (in constant 2019 dollars). At the same time, other countries have maintained or increased their spending on agricultural R&D.

The federal government funds about two-thirds of public agricultural research in the United States, with state governments and non-government sources funding the rest.

With federal funding, land-grant universities and other non-federal institutions perform about 70% of U.S. public agricultural research. USDA agencies perform the remainder.

USDA produces desert locust genome

The first high-quality genome of the desert locust—those voracious feeders of plague and devastation infamy and the most destructive migratory insect in the world—has been produced by U.S. Department of Agriculture Agricultural Research Service scientists (ARS).

The genome of the desert locust (Schistocerca gregaria) is enormous at just under 9 billion base pairs, nearly three times the size of the human genome. The desert locust is one of the largest insect genomes ever completed and it was all done from a single locust.

Desert locust plagues are cyclic and have been recorded since the times of the Pharaohs in ancient Egypt, as far back as 3200 B.C. In recent decades, there have been desert locust swarms in 1967-1969, 1986-1989 and most lately 2020-2022. They cause devastation in East Africa, the Middle East, and Southwest Asia, threatening food security in many countries.

Their damage can be massive. A small swarm can eat as much food in a day as would feed 35,000 people; a swarm of historic proportions covering the area of New York City eats in one day the same amount as the population of New York, Pennsylvania and New Jersey combined, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Current desert locust control mostly depends on locating swarms and spraying them with broad-spectrum pesticides. Ultimately, this genomics work could decrease dependence on such pesticides.

The research is part of the Ag100Pest Initiative, a program of USDA’s Agricultural Research Service to develop high quality genomes for the top 100 arthropod pests in agriculture as a foundation for basic and applied research.