Very cool to see our farmdoc Daily article on farmers' use of futures markets (farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2024/12/risk...) cited by Joe Vaclavik this morning: youtu.be/WY0B3UD9Zhk?.... Data show the majority of grain farms, even large ones, don't have a brokerage account and aren't using futures.

After a successful 2025 edition, the NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis will be back in Chicago, April 20-21, 2026. I'm co-organizing. The deadline to submit presentation proposals is Nov 21: farmdoc.illinois.edu/nccc134/subm... Submit papers now and join us in April!

The farmdoc team at University of Illinois is fortunate to have great partners like FBFM who keep our analysis grounded in real-world data on farm finances and the agricultural economy.

I had the pleasure of speaking to an extraordinary group of state and provincial legislators at the International Legislators Forum in Deadwood, SD: agree.org/2025-interna... I talked about ongoing tariff shock and impacts on agricultural commodity trade. Hard to understate how big a change this is.

The 2025 NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis (farmdoc.illinois.edu/nccc134/attend) met this week at the Illini Center in downtown Chicago. We had 54 researchers attending and 25 presentations on new research in commodity markets.

Last chance to register for the NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis. This academic conference on agricultural commodity markets meets April 14-15 at the Illini Center in Chicago. Program, venue and hotel info, and registration here: buff.ly/3Qx6Qg3

Interested in research on commodity markets/trading/pricing? We are just 8 weeks away from the latest iteration of the NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis, Forecasting, and Market Risk Management.

Peru's remarkable success in blueberry production stems from ideal growing conditions, strategic harvest timing, private sector and government investment, and notably, its empowerment of rural women workers, who comprise 40% of the workforce in this booming agricultural sector.

The second in this series is from Sohyeon Ryu, PhD student, who is interested in renewable energy in the aviation and the ongoing transition to sustainable aviation fuel (SAF).

https://buff.ly/3WjPLd5

Every year, my grad students take some part of their research on agricultural and resource markets and adapt it for non-academic audiences. We take their work and share it with the world over the holidays on @farmdocdaily.

This study of Illinois grain farms offers lessons from the last downturn in the farm economy between 2015 and 2018. It reveals that farms with moderate to high levels of working capital at the start of this period performed significantly better, with higher overall net farm income.

Last call for submissions!

The paper proposal deadline for the 2025 NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis, Forecasting, and Market Risk Management in Chicago, Illinois is this Friday, November 22. Full details on how to submit are on our website: https://buff.ly/3ARmgYo

Doing research on commodity markets/trading/pricing? I’m organizing the next iteration of the NCCC-134 Conference. We’ve been gathering researchers to discuss all things agricultural markets and prices; we’ll do that again for the 43rd(!) time next April 14-15 in Chicago.