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Several sections of the website, including the membership directory and the events page, are being updated. Any questions, comments, or concerns should be directed to Executive Secretary Martha Shy at mshy@cpccommodities.com.

Several forms have been added for those attending the Southern Feed & Grain Association Convention.  Please locate the forms on the Events page or below.

Agenda – 2016 SFGA Convention

Registration Letter – 2016 SFGA Convention

Contribution Form – 2016 SFGA Convention

Booth Registration Form

Enrollment Form – 2016 SFGA Convention

Payment by Credit Card – 2016 SFGA Convention

The 2016 Southern Feed and Grain Association Convention will be held in Sandestin, Florida from July 24 until 27, 2016.

The Hotel Housing Form is now online.  Please make your reservation soon to ensure you get the room you requested.

The Alabama Feed and Grain Association Membership Application is also available.

Any questions should be directed to Edna Walker (edna@alabamafeedandgrain.com) of the Alabama Feed and Grain Association.

: Americans’ confidence in the economy retreated in April, with Gallup’s Economic Confidence Index averaging -14 for the month, down from -10 in March. The April average ties with September 2015 as numerically the worst since confidence started climbing toward positive territory in late 2014 and early 2015 after gas prices began to decline. The high point in confidence in Gallup’s eight-year tracking trend occurred in January 2015, when the monthly index averaged +3, while the low point was -60 in October 2008. Interestingly, Americans’ confidence in the economy is influenced to a significant degree by political considerations, namely the match between an individual’s party identification and the party of the U.S. president. As such, Democrats have consistently had greater confidence than independents and especially Republicans during Barack Obama’s presidency. All three party groups showed slight drops of between two and four index points in April compared with March. The April U.S. Economic Confidence Index score was +10 among Democrats, -15 among independents and -38 among Republicans. (Source: Gallup)

If you want to look to the future of food production, its important to look at the trends in crop breeding technology, specifically at the countries with the most patent activity. According to research from Thomson Reuters and their “9 Billion Bowls” project, a research piece I encourage everyone to read in full-detail, China is making a bold push to be the world’s breadbasket of the future, perhaps within the next decade. As it stand now the U.S. and China alone represent 68% of all the patent documents associated with crop breeding around the world. From what I understand these two countries are larger than the closet competing country by at least a factor of five. However, it’s notable that while the U.S. has more patent applications over the past 5 years than China, the majority of the U.S. documents are coming from a small collection of private companies, while the Chinese applications are coming from a larger number of academic institutions. Once China’s private industry begins patenting, there is a high likelihood that they will pass the U.S. in the number of crop breeding patent applications produced. Based on the recent filing data, it’s clear that China has taken a a more aggressive interest in crop breeding and is using these innovations to position themselves not only to meet the needs of their own domestic population, but to potentially challenge the U.S. as the “Breadbasket of the World.” This is a terrific bit of research and there’s a lot more interesting data worth digesting. You can see form the information that the Thompson Reuters team has put a lot of time and research into this study and have certainly delivered a quality report. (Source: Thomson Reuters, 9 Billion Bowls)