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Continuing Resolution ahead as disagreements continue… A government shutdown looms less than three-weeks away and lawmakers still can’t agree on how to avert it or the potential impact it could have on constituents, including farmers and ranchers. The only agreement by the two parties’ Congressional leaders so far is the need for a continuing budget resolution to keep the lights on. But what’s in it and how long it should last is undecided.
Top Senate Appropriations Democrat Patty Murray said, “My hope would be that whatever that CR looks like, that it’s clean and that it enables us to buy some time to get a regular appropriations process done. But we will, inevitably, it looks like, need a CR for some time in the foreseeable future.”
Senate Democrats insist Republicans first restore Obamacare subsidies clipped earlier, while President Trump wants a CR into late January. House Speaker Mike Johnson backs a short-term CR while conferencing USDA and two other bills with the Senate saying, “We have not done the appropriations process the way it is legally supposed to work in a long, long time around here. And we’re trying to force the body back to that.” -source: NAFB Newswire
A brief USDA report overview…
- USDA’s estimate of 2025-26 wheat carryover is now 844 million bushels, down 25 million from last month. USDA increased estimated exports by 25 million to account to the cut to wheat carryover. Next up for the wheat market is the September 30 Quarterly Grain Stocks and Annual Small Grains Summary.
- USDA increased it’s corn crop production estimate 72 million bu. from last month... but it got there in a round-about way. The national average corn yield was cut 2.1 bushels per acre from last month to 186.7 bushels per acre... but harvested acres were increased 1.356 million from last month. Total new-crop demand was increased 100 million bushels from last month to offset the bigger supplies... the end result was a 7-million-acre slide in estimated corn carryover from August. But – that is about 80 million bushels above the average pre-report trade guess on new-crop carryover.
- USDA trimmed 0.1 bu. from last month’s national average bean yield to land the estimate at 53.5 bushels per acre. Harvested bean acres were increased 209,000 from last month resulting in a 9-million-bushel increase in the size of this year’s bean crop. USDA raised new-crop bean carryover 10 million bushels from last month – that is 12 million bushels more than the average pre-report trade estimate. USDA increased its new-crop bean crush estimate, but more-than-offset that increase with a cut to the export outlook.
January soybean purchase reported this week… According to a Reuters report out late today, a weekly soybean export sale to China was erroneously included with this week’s export sales. The sale actually took place in January according to USDA data.
Reuters reported, “The USDA had included a 67,849 metric ton sale to the world’s top soy importer in its sales data for the week ended September 4, noting the transaction was reported late.”
U.S. Census Bureau data tallied the total value of China’s 2024 soybean imports at 26.8 million metric tons for a total value more than $12.6 billion. “China has yet to buy any soybeans from the autumn U.S. harvest,” according to Reuters.
Land Management Bureau to roll-back Public Lands Rule… The Bureau of Land Management says it is working to roll back rules that allowed conservation leases on its land. The Biden era 2024 Public Lands Rule was designed to give conservation uses of the land the same standing as energy production, mining, grazing and recreation.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said in a press release, “The previous administration’s Public Lands Rule had the potential to block access to hundreds of thousands of acres of multiple-use land — preventing energy and mineral production, timber management, grazing, and recreation across the West.”
An Editorial… The tragic, public assassination of Charlie Kirk will leave a scar on what has already been a year of tumult and unrest. Ideas, once lodged and accepted penetrate deeper than bullets and have vastly more power for good or evil.
I was in a local store this week wearing a tee shirt that read, “I read the news today, oh boy.” Of course it’s a quote from a Beatles song and I’ve always thought it was clever because I read the news everyday on AgriTalk. A woman in the store commented on my shirt near the exit door where I stood.
She said, “I saw people have their flags at half mast on my way over here. There was even a school with their flag at half mast.” I nodded and said that I had my flag at half mast too and remarked it was a sad day.
Shocked, she said, “That man was no patriot!” To which I replied, “Well ma’am I guess we respectfully disagree,” with a soft tone and a gentle smile. The woman looked at me in horror and stormed out. I was respectful, not looking to debate or argue, but the woman acted as though this were the most defiling thing she had encountered in a long time.
I don’t know what to do with that. I don’t know how we move forward when honest conversations can be perceived as so threatening. When those like Kirk with the courage to state their faith and beliefs clearly while offering an assembly an open mic for debate are perceived as a mortal threat. It has been a harrowing week for us all for a wide variety of reasons.
What I told my children is this: We must choose faith over futility. We must understand why we believe what we believe to the point where disagreement and hostility have no bearing on our demeanor and conduct. We must be willing to counter hatred with forgiveness both for ourselves and for others. Prayer and comfort of the scriptures must be our refuge, because, left unchecked, the heart of man can become a very dark place. -Davis Michaelsen
Notable closes…
Corn futures refused to go down on bearish news from USDA. December corn futures opened steady and drifted to the downside before recovering to post the highest close since July 3.
- December corn futures were 10-and-a-quarter cents higher at 4-30
- March corn up a dime to 4-47-and-a-quarter
- May corn futures closed at 4-57, up 9-and-a-half cents
Long liquidation again dominated the cattle complex. Boxed beef prices were slightly lower this morning but Choice-graded beef was still just slightly above 400-dollars per hundredweight.
- October live cattle were $2.30 lower at $229.97 ½
- December live cattle down $2.20 to $231.92 ½
- October feeder cattle futures down $6.55 to $345.80... the lowest close in October feeders since August 14
Your weekend read… Farmers are not crying wolf. The wolf is real and right outside the door in the form of generational collapse.
The inescapable crop math of sustained crippling commodity prices and high input costs has many growers screaming for immediate relief, potentially via aid payments in late 2025 or early 2026. However, bailouts are Band-Aids over bullet holes.
Alarm has turned to extreme despair on many operations. On Sept. 2, 2025, a telltale farm meeting went nuclear. Field representatives from the offices of Sen. Tom Cotton, Sen. John Boozman and Rep. Rick Crawford, along with a rep sent by Gov. Sarah Sanders, initially intended to speak with a handful of growers in Brookland, Ark.
Instead, 400-plus farmers packed the house to overflow on a Tuesday — despite the pressing demands of rice and corn harvest and a mere three days’ notice — and unleashed a chain of grievances.
Click here to read Chris Bennett’s article, “Outraged Farmers Blame Ag Monopolies as Catastrophic Collapse Looms” on AgWeb.com.