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Here is your daily Oklahoma farm and ranch news update. 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Featured Story:

USDA 2015 Net Farm Income Plunges Thirty Eight Percent Compared to 2014 at $55.9 Billion

 

Farm sector profitability is forecast to decline for the second straight year. Net cash farm income is forecast at $93 billion, down about 28 percent from 2014 levels. Net farm income is forecast to be $55.9 billion in 2015, down about 38 percent from 2014's estimate of $90.4 billion. If realized, the 2015 forecast for net farm income would be the lowest since 2002 (in both real and nominal terms) and a drop of 55 percent from the recent high of $123.3 billion in 2013. The smaller change in net cash farm income relative to the broader net farm income measure is to be expected, because producers can exercise greater control on the timing of cash receipts and expenses and thereby moderate large swings from year to year.


Lower crop and livestock receipts are the main drivers of the decline in 2015, while cash production expenses are projected down by 2.3 percent. Crop receipts are expected to decrease by $18.2 billion (8.7 percent) in 2015, led by projected declines of $8.6-billion in corn receipts, $5.7 billion in soybean receipts, and $2.7 billion in wheat receipts, as prices for all three commodities declined. Livestock receipts are forecast to decrease by $25.4 billion (12 percent) in 2015. As with crop receipts, the primary driver is lower commodity prices, in this case for milk, hogs, broilers, and cattle/calves. Government payments are projected to rise $1.0 billion (10.4 percent) to $10.8 billion in 2015.


After the Income Report was released, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack offered a statement attempting to minimize the huge drop in farm income predicted for 2015:  Click here to read more from Vilsack and the find the complete Farm Income Report.

Glenn Selk Talks With Dr. Rod Hall About the Veterinary Feed Directive on SUNUP

 

NCGA Commends Farm Service Agency Revision to County Rules for ARC-CO Program

 

The Farm Service Agency recently approved a modification allowing growers on a farm with one or more tracts outside the administrative county the option to recalculate Agriculture Risk Coverage-CO benefits based on the farm's physical location. This decision follows an extensive of review of the potential impacts of the previous requirement that payments for the Agriculture Risk Coverage program be based on the administrative county where farm records are maintained.


"NCGA worked determinedly to bring this issue to the attention of FSA Administrator Val Dolcini. We greatly appreciate his consideration of our concerns and the decision to act on the information we provided," said National Corn Growers Association Public Policy Action Team Chair Steve Ebke.


According to the FSA Administrator's office, the payments for farms enrolled in 2014 and 2015 with payments "would be recalculated in each physical location and summed for the farm using weights according to the number of base acres (including attributed acres) in each county."


More on how the adjustments announced by FSA work available here.

USMEF's Phil Seng Finds Opportunity Knocks to Sell Beef Globally

 

When it comes to beef promotion, the lure of selling more US beef into the international market has become a significant enticement to many state beef councils.  As a result- several states(including Oklahoma) are dedicating more funding to special projects to sell more beef overseas. U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF) President and CEO Phil Seng said international markets are a good investment with 95 percent of the world's consumers living outside the United States.


"The international market place presents tremendous potential," Seng said. "All of these growing middle classes want to evolve from the cereals to the proteins."


By 2030, 60 percent of the world's middle class will be located in Asia. The U.S. is currently negotiating the terms of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement. Seng said those 12 countries represent 70 percent of the world's purchases of meat products and that demand will grow as their economies improve.

Seng has been our guest for a series of Beef Buzz features- part three on state beef councils liking their bang for the buck can be heard here.  Part one of our Beef Buzzes with Phil Seng can be heard by clicking here...and part two of the Beef Buzz focus with Phil Seng of the USMEF can be heard by clicking here.

We are also pleased to have American Farmers & Ranchers Mutual Insurance Company as a regular sponsor of our daily update. On both the state and national levels, full-time staff members serve as a "watchdog" for family agriculture producers, mutual insurance company members and life company members. Click here to go to their AFR website to learn more about their efforts to serve rural America!

Future of Enlist Duo in Doubt As EPA Considers Withdrawal  of Registration for 2,4-D and Glyphosate Product

 

 
The EPA has responded to pressure from several consumer activist groups and rolled back the registration of the Ag chemical mix that has been marketed for much of 2015 as Enlist Duo. The product, marketed by Dow AgroSciences, was granted a label for six states in October 2014, with EPA adding nine more states this past March- including Oklahoma. A part of the label that was approved for the combination of 2,4-D and Glyphosate was a buffer of thirty feet around areas sprayed with the product.


EPA now claims that they have received new information suggesting that the thirty foot buffer was not adequate for the combo mix.- that the synergistic action of the active ingredients was more powerful that what EPA was expecting.


The Center for Food Safety, the Natural Resource Defense Council and several other groups took the EPA to court- and succeeded in getting EPA to agree to withdraw the license at this time and consider the impact of the products on non target plants.

After the decision was announced on Wednesday, Dow quickly responded and in a statement provided to the Radio Oklahoma Ag Network, stated "Dow AgroSciences is confident in the extensive data supporting Enlist Duo herbicide. We are working with EPA to quickly provide further assurances that our product's conditions of registered use will continue to protect the environment, including threatened and endangered plant species. Recognizing the pressing needs of U.S. farmers for access to Enlist Duo to counter the rapidly increasing spread of resistant weeds - and in light of the comprehensive nature of the regulatory assessments already conducted to support the Enlist Duo registration - we expect that these new evaluations will result in a prompt resolution of all outstanding issues."

Click here to read more from both sides on these question about Enlist Duo- and we also have a link to the legal brief brought against EPA from this past week.

 

 

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National Grazing Lands Conference Set to Provide Land Stewardship Information

 

Contributed by Samuel Roberts Noble Foundation Producer Relations Manager Hugh Aljoe.


The 6th National Conference on Grazing Lands is a conference held for livestock producers by livestock producers, especially producers who are interested in good land stewardship. The central theme of the conference presentations will be balancing economic sustainability with environmental sustainability. A producer cannot be economically sustainable long-term without being environmentally sustainable.


The conference will be held on Dec. 13-16, 2015, at the Hyatt Regency DFW in Grapevine, Texas. Ranch tours and a variety of presentations will be given. Presenters include producers recognized for their outstanding land stewardship and nationally renowned professionals including Don Ball, Ph.D.; Rachel Gilker, Ph.D.; Garry Lacefield, Ph.D.; and Kathy Voth. The Noble Foundation will host two sessions, as well. The first will include presentations from three successful Noble Foundation producers with three different types of operations. The second session will be an open forum titled "Ask the Noble Foundation Consultants," where producers from across the country can bring their questions to be answered using the integrated multidisciplinary consulting approach of the Noble Foundation consultants. Expect to find the Noble Foundation consultants attending through the duration of the conference.


The National Grazing Lands Coalition (NatGLC) is a collaborative association of agricultural producers and organizations working together to maintain and improve the management and health of the nation's private and public grazing lands. The coalition is driven by agricultural producers and organizations specializing in conservation, scientific research, watershed benefits and erosion control.  Click or tap here for more information about the conference.

This N That- Rainfall Drowns Drought, Peach to Serve as State Exec Director for FSA(Again) and RFS Details DUE Today 

 

Rain, Sleet, ice and some snow pelted and poured across the state of Oklahoma over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend- and here's a map that reflects how much liquid precipitation the state has received as of Sunday night- as the rain event was winding down.

 

Please note some of the southwestern and west central rainfall totals do not reflect ice that had not thawed on Sunday. 

 

The rainfall winners were all in Little Dixie- Hugo with almost ten inches of rainfall (9.8") while Cloudy and Mt Herman had more than eight inches of rain from this very wet system. 

 

Here's that promised map:

 

 

 

Click here for the realtime Oklahoma Mesonet map of rainfall that is being updated on a rolling basis. 

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Terry Peach from Mooreland has a lengthy pedigree of government service to farmers and ranchers in our state- and he has agreed to jump back into that arena for the next year as the State Executive Director of the Oklahoma Farm Service Agency of the USDA. 

This post makes him one of two top USDA officials serving in the state of Oklahoma.  And- for Terry- it's his second time to be the SED for Oklahoma FSA- having served in that role when Bill Clinton was President in the 1990s.

Terry also served for eight years from 2003- 2011 as the Oklahoma State Secretary of Agriculture during the Brad Henry Administration for Oklahoma.

Read more by clicking here about Terry's background- he could find this is a one year job if the GOP wins the White House next year- and it could turn into a much longer posting if the Democrats hang onto the Presidency. 

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The Obama Administration's EPA has promised the Federal Courts that multiple years of federal volume mandates for the Renewable Fuel Standard will be delivered by November 30th- TODAY.

According to Reuters, "The EPA is broadly expected to raise the mandates for quantity of biofuels that fuel companies must blend into motor fuels some 400 million to 500 million gallons for 2016, bringing the total renewable fuels required to nearly 18 billion gallons" based on  four sources Reuters was citing.


The National Corn Growers have been lobbying Democratic members of Congress- hoping they will put pressure on the Administration to deliver a friendly number when they release the volume numbers. "We are asking the Obama Administration: don't write off rural America," said NCGA President Chip Bowling of Maryland. "The Renewable Fuel Standard is good for our economy, our energy independence, and the environment. We have asked the Environmental Protection Agency and the White House to follow the statute and restore the 2014-16 corn ethanol volume."

Click here to read more about the last minute campaign the Corn Growers have orchestrated to get what they want from EPA on the RFS.

Our thanks to Midwest Farms Shows, P & K Equipment, American Farmers & Ranchers, KIS Futures, Stillwater Milling Company, Farm Assure,  CROPLAN by Winfield, Pioneer Cellular , National Livestock Credit Corporation and the Oklahoma Cattlemen's Association for their support of our daily Farm News Update. For your convenience, we have our sponsors' websites linked here- just click on their name to jump to their website- check their sites out and let these folks know you appreciate the support of this daily email, as their sponsorship helps us keep this arriving in your inbox on a regular basis- at NO Charge!

 

 

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