Arkansas bans dicamba
Last week, Arkansas state lawmakers voted to ban sprayings of dicamba-based fertilizers between April 16 and Oct. 31, dealing a blow to manufacturers Monsanto Co. and BASF SE. This comes after reports that dicamba-based fertilizers drifted to other fields in recent years, damaging crops not meant to tolerate the herbicides. Monsanto has sued the state to stop the ban. A number of other states have also limited dicamba sprayings.

Farm bill principles released
U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue today announced the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farm Bill and Legislative Principles for 2018. The list includes the following goals:

• Provide a farm safety net that helps American farmers weather times of economic stress without distorting markets or increasing shallow loss payments.
• Promote a variety of innovative crop insurance products and changes, enabling farmers to make sound production decisions and to manage operational risk.
• Encourage entry into farming through increased access to land and capital for young, beginning, veteran and underrepresented farmers.
• Ensure that voluntary conservation programs balance farm productivity with conservation benefits so the most fertile and productive lands remain in production while land retired for conservation purposes favor more environmentally sensitive acres.
• Support conservation programs that ensure cost-effective financial assistance for improved soil health, water and air quality and other natural resource benefits.

Trump administration’s infrastructure plan
The six-page infrastructure plan for the Trump administration describes “funding principles” and “principles for infrastructure improvements” for the Trump administration’s infrastructure plan. The spending breakdown: infrastructure incentives initiative (50 percent); transformative projects (10 percent); rural infrastructure (25 percent); federal credit programs (7 percent); federal capital financing fund (5 percent). The draft document does not contain any details on how much funding would be available or where it would come from.

New tariffs could spark retaliation from China
The U.S. slapped steep tariffs on washing machines and solar energy cells and panels from China, the first major step to erect the kind of trade barriers that Trump has said are necessary to protect American manufacturers. The decision is being seen as a prelude to coming actions on steel and aluminum imports, as well as a wide-ranging case that aims to punish China for intellectual property abuses and agricultural subsidies. U.S. agriculture stakeholders are watching China to see whether it will target imports of U.S. soybeans or other agriculture products as it responds to the duties. President Trump said he is not worried about a trade war; instead, he said, manufacturers will be coming to the United States to build both products. His comments on the North American Free Trade Agreement continue to make GOP lawmakers nervous.

“NAFTA’s moving along pretty well,” Trump said. “I happen to be of the opinion that if it doesn’t work out we’ll terminate it.”

U.S. poultry industry would be hard-hit by any NAFTA withdrawal
The U.S. exports around 20 percent of its poultry production to Mexico each year. If the U.S. were to pull out of NAFTA, Mexico could put tariffs of up to 75 percent on U.S. chicken and turkey under its World Trade Organization commitments. Even a 25 percent tariff would make it difficult to sell poultry in Mexico, resulting in a glut of chicken legs and higher prices in the U.S., says Sanderson Farms Chief Financial Officer Mike Cockrell. He says any such development would be comparable to the impact of Russia’s 2002 ban on U.S. chicken imports. If NAFTA is scrapped, the U.S. would face increased competition from Brazil, the world’s number one chicken exporter that has tariff-free access to the Mexican market through 2019.

ADM makes takeover bid for Bunge
ADM made a takeover approach to crop trader Bunge, setting up a possible bidding war with Glencore. A Wall Street Journal article on the topic notes that, “An ADM-Bunge combination would likely face stiff regulatory hurdles, given the companies’ competing grain facilities, shipping terminals and processing plants. Glencore’s agricultural division has a smaller presence than ADM’s and Bunge’s in key crop-exporting bread baskets like the U.S. and Brazil, so a Glencore deal could face fewer such hurdles.”

Final cold storage report for 2017
Total frozen poultry supplies on Dec. 31, 2017 were up 1 percent from the previous month and up 10 percent from a year ago. Total stocks of chicken were down 1 percent from the previous month but up 10 percent from last year. Total pounds of turkey in freezers were up 8 percent from last month and up 12 percent from Dec. 31, 2016.

Total red meat supplies in freezers were down 1 percent from the previous month and down 6 percent from last year. Total pounds of beef in freezers were up 1 percent from the previous month but down 14 percent from last year.  Frozen pork supplies were down 2 percent from the previous month but up 3 percent from last year. Stocks of pork bellies were up 13 percent from last month and up 121 percent from last year.