Wheat Farming News
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FAO Food Price Index steady in February, palm oil rises
The FAO Food Price Index was stable in February, as falling sugar and dairy prices offset a substantial jump in vegetable oil prices from the previous month. Averaging 150.2 points for the month, the FAO Food Price Index was virtually unchanged from a revised 150.0 points in January and down 14.5 percent from a year ago. FAO also issued its first forecast for the world's 2016 wheat harvest, ...
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FAO Food Price Index starts 2016 dropping to nearly 7-year low
The FAO Food Price Index fell in January, slipping 1.9 percent below its level in the last month of 2015, as prices of all the commodities it tracks fell, sugar in particular. The Food Price Index averaged 150.4 points in January, down 16 percent from a year earlier and registering its lowest level since April 2009. The FAO Food Price Index is a trade-weighted index tracking international ...
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Ecosystem-based farming comes of age
A new FAO book out today takes a close look at how the world's major cereals maize, rice and wheat - which together account for an estimated 42.5 percent of human calories and 37 percent of our protein - can be grown in ways that respect and even leverage natural ecosystems. Drawing on case studies from around the planet, the new book illustrates how the "Save and Grow" approach to agriculture ...
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FAO food price index drops in December
Prices of major food commodities declined for the fourth year in a row in 2015, averaging 19.1 percent below their previous-year's levels, as the dwindling global economy also triggered sharp price falls from metals to energy markets. FAO's Food Price Index averaged 164.1 points over 2015 and ended the year even lower, at 154.1 points during the month of December. In December, the index ...
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Choosing for not-genetically modified soy results in higher costs for livestock
If the Netherlands together with Germany, France, Poland and Hungary would choose for an opt-out of the use of genetically modified (GM) soy in animal feed, then the current use of soy products in animal feed in these five countries must decrease by 40 to 50% to ensure that the demand for non-GM soy from the European Union (EU) does not exceed the available amount on the world market. Mid-term (3 ...
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Use of residues from agriculture and forestry as energy source improves food security
The sustainability of growing crops for use as energy sources has been disputed for many years. A potentially attractive alternative is to use waste and residues from agricultural and forestry. However, using waste and other residues may have an impact on land use, biodiversity and food security. The additional sources of income from the sale of waste and other residues could prompt an increase ...
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Ohio State Economist Offers 2016 Grain Market Outlook
Grain prices aren’t likely to rise next year thanks to stagnant demand growth and ample grain supplies, says an agricultural economist with the College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences at The Ohio State University. With the slowing Chinese economy contributing to stagnant demand growth and the ample supply thanks to large harvests in major production nations the past two ...
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Straw covering on soil can increase crop yields and improve the efficiency of water use
Straw from previous harvests can be used to help increase crop yields and improve the efficiency of water use in arid regions, finds a new study from China. By testing different techniques to improve water efficiency, the researchers found that the most effective method involved using straw to cover the soil when growing maize and wheat together in the same growing season. In north-western ...
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Adverse weather pushes food prices up in October
Major food commodity prices rose in October, spurred by weather-driven concerns about sugar and palm oil supplies. The FAO Food Price Index averaged nearly 162 points in October, up 3.9 percent from September, while still down 16 percent from a year earlier. FAO's latest Cereal Supply and Demand Brief slightly trimmed its October 2015 forecast for global cereal production and now ...
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Fertiliser Helps Grower Claim Record Wheat Yield
A Peterborough-based fertiliser tank supplier is reinforcing the importance of storing large volumes of fertiliser correctly in order to benefit from bulk-buying savings and to reduce wastage. As a Northumberland grower attributes his claimed world record wheat yield to fertiliser. Northumberland farmer, Rod Smith, claims to have achieved a world record wheat yield of 16.52t/ha and attributes ...
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Patents fail to boost crop yields
Policies that secure intellectual property rights (IPRs) for agricultural innovations often fail to encourage technology transfer to developing countries or increase crop yields, a study shows. “Intellectual property rights are not all they are cracked up to be,” says David Spielman, a co-author of the study and researcher at the International Food Policy Research Institute, based in ...
By SciDev.Net
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Some plants are more sensitive to herbicides during reproductive stages of life cycle
This study assessed the effects of herbicides on non-target plants in Denmark and Canada. The findings showed that some plants are more sensitive to herbicides in the reproductive stages of their life cycle and can experience delays in flowering and reduced seed production. The authors say future ecological assessments should consider reproductive outcomes. Herbicides are some of the most widely ...
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FAO Food Price Index registers sharpest fall since December 2008
International food commodity prices continued to decline in August as ample supplies, a slump in energy prices and concerns over China's economic slowdown all contributed to the sharpest fall of the FAO Food Price Index in almost seven years. The index averaged 155.7 points in August 2015, down 5.2 percent from July, the steepest monthly drop since December 2008, with virtually all major food ...
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National Soy Checkoff Targets Soybean Innovation for Farmer Profit Opportunities
Maximizing the profit potential of every U.S. soybean farmer means seeing beyond today; it means driving soybean innovation in products and services to meet customers’ needs tomorrow. That’s why the farmer-leaders of the national soy checkoff made driving innovation the center of their new, groundbreaking 5-year strategic plan, which will guide all national soy checkoff investments ...
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Ohio’s 2015 Wheat Crop Faced Tough Year
Growers wondering how this year’s historic rains have impacted wheat now have proof that it has indeed been a tough year for the crop, according to the results of the 2015 Ohio Wheat Performance Test. The test results are offered by researchers with the College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences at The Ohio State University and can be viewed at go.osu.edu/wheatresults. They ...
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Winter Wheat Harvest Woes
Wheat harvest season is well underway for many U.S. wheat growers. Some of the first soft-red wheat harvested by U.S. farmers in 2015 is the worst in at least 17 years, according to Bloomberg and other sources. This year’s heavy rainfalls – up to three times the normal amount – have made mycotoxin diseases like vomitoxin more prominent in many wheat-growing states. USDA ...
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Wheat Initiative launches its Strategic Research Agenda
To meet the expected 60% raise in demand for wheat by 2050, coordination of research and significant investments are needed to increase wheat sustainable production globally. The Wheat Initiative presented today its Strategic Research Agenda (SRA) to the G20 Agricultural Chief Scientists gathered in Turkey. Wheat is a staple food worldwide and provides 20% of all calories and protein, both in ...
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Life cycle study demonstrates the long-term costs of everyday crops
The environmental and economic costs of a selection of common crops have been determined by a new study, which hopes to improve agricultural sustainability assessments in Europe. The researchers used life cycle analysis on organically farmed tomatoes and pears, and intensively farmed wheat, apples, and lettuce to show the overall impact of agricultural methods. Agriculture accounts for 45% of ...
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Canadian Government Supports New Infrared Grain-Sorting Technology at Winnipeg-Based Feed Mill
The owners of a Winnipeg feed mill will receive $1.1 million to install two new infrared grain sorters which will identify and remove undesirable grain kernels, significantly increasing the value of the final product, Minister of State Kevin Sorenson along with Member of Parliament Lawrence Toet, on behalf of Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz, and Manitoba Agriculture, Food and Rural ...
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A worldwide network of seed information is taking root
As an increasingly bloody civil war raged around them, a team of scientists in the Syrian capital Aleppo quietly packaged and shipped a series of nondescript cardboard boxes to an island not far from the North Pole. The boxes bore no sign of the conflict that had surrounded them or the precious material they contained. The scientists, from an International Centre for Agricultural Research in the ...
By SciDev.Net
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