Fourth Quarter Snapshot
Fourth Quarter Snapshot. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Line On Agriculture.
The New Year is bringing some guarded optimism for northwest ag producers. Michael Stolp with Northwest Farm Credit Services takes a look at the health of the northwest ag industry in the 4th quarter of 2010.
STOLP: As we look at wheat markets earlier in the year we saw a bump up in wheat prices largely related to Russia saying they are no longer going to export and then later in the year we saw wheat prices climb even higher and the reason for those higher prices may not be so much raw supply driven as it is supply of quality milling wheat and certainly as producers close out their old crop and look to the new crop there’s some real opportunities for some nice prices.
He says there is also a lot of optimism in the cow/calf market.
STOLP: Calf prices ended 2010 at strong levels and looking at 2011 there’s expectations that those levels should be sustained or possibly even climb higher. Contrasting the cow/calf strength if we turn to the dairy market, we’ll see the dairy market after improving in the later part of 2010 prices have fallen again as we’ve entered 2011.
He says that challenge is also impacted by the high price of corn.STOLP: We also see hay markets finding some strength in 2010 and entering 2011 and the reason for that strength is largely due to supplies of quality hay. We had a cool wet spring and parts of summer that didn’t find a lot of that quality hay available and what’s left certainly has strong prices.
Stolp now talks about row crops and fruit..
STOLP: Potato producers are optimistic. It was a smaller crop than last year and prices in that market are strong. Onion prices are also strong. Sugar beet growers have also done well finding strong prices but the big question in the sugar beet market right now is the availability of RoundUp ready seed. In our tree fruit areas we see apples with relatively strong prices bolstered by lower world supplies of apples but in the apple market one of the concerns in isolated areas is the extent to which that November cold snap we had impacted the trees and their production in the coming year.
That was also a concern for wine-grape producers but wine sales have continued to be strong. Northwest FCS provides financing, related services and crop insurance to farmers, ranchers, agribusinesses, commercial fishermen, timber producers, and rural homeowners in Montana, Idaho, Oregon, Washington, and Alaska.
That’s today’s Line On Agriculture. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.
