Newsletter
WASHINGTON — The American Farm Bureau Federation joined 119 other agriculture organizations in sending a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) asking for an extension of time to comment on its proposed rule, “The Enhancement and Standardization of Climate Related Disclosures for Investors.”
The SEC – whose primary purpose is to protect investors, maintain efficient markets and facilitate capital formation – now wants to require public companies to report data about their entire supply chain. Nearly every farmer’s and rancher’s products eventually touch a publicly traded company, meaning that farmers and ranchers could be forced to report personal information and business-related data. This unprecedented overreach could create onerous reporting requirements for even small farms and ranches with few or no employees.
“This appears to be an example of overreach by the Securities and Exchange Commission,” said AFBF President Zippy Duvall. “Farmers and ranchers are already heavily regulated by multiple agencies at the local, state and the federal level. New SEC reporting requirements will no doubt make an already complicated patchwork of regulations even more cumbersome.
“Farmers and ranchers are focused on growing the food, fuel and fiber this country needs, and have never been subjected to SEC regulations. Unlike the large corporations currently regulated by the SEC, family farms and ranches don’t have teams of compliance officers. We urge the SEC to extend the comment period to allow those in agriculture time to understand the full impact of this proposal and offer meaningful input.”
The proposed rule is 510 pages long with 1,068 technical footnotes and almost 750 direct questions, but the SEC has only allowed 39 days for review.
The proposed rule “may create multiple, new sources of substantial costs and liabilities,” the letter states. “These include almost certain reporting obligations, technical challenges, significant financial and operational disruption and the risk of financially crippling legal liabilities.”
–American Farm Bureau Federation
Wool update
The markets are considerably slow in actual sales and movement of wool. Plenty of reason to explain the challenges, but a couple are probably more impactful overall. Growers, brokers, processors, and manufacturing continue to deal with shipping slowdowns. The Wuhan Chinese virus effects are still lingering. This has affected backlog of goods being delivered due to labor shortages in shipping, processing, and manufacturing. Labor shortages are also evident for the processing and manufacturing areas. Workers still have not returned to work after the PPP program that paid workers to not go to work.
The other challenge is inflation. For the wool pipeline to operated more smoothly price stability for overhead fixed cost is king. The raw material (grease wool) does not have the same level of influence on profitability by itself. Raw material cost is less than 10% of overhead cost to first stage processing. Energy cost makes up for over 40% of first stage processing overhead cost. The uncertainty and higher energy cost are not easily past on to succeeding segments of the wool conversion chain. Caution is taken since raw material is the first level of defense to protect the bottom line.
To top things off the Chinese have shut down Shanghai (Major delivery for raw wool) in the past week preventing any deliveries. Brokers can not even deliver documents to purchasers because of no courier service. Also a war in Europe.
The net effect will be a slow movement of wool into the marketing and processing sectors for the short and mid term timeframe. Prices have been fairly steady, but buyers and users are not ready to secure large volume of wool to have in stockpile. It is estimated that since the start of the pandemic in 2020 there is at least 30% of US wool production on the market in 2021 remains unsold. The better quality wool will again be sought after first with inferior wool setting on the shelf.
We are just now seeing wool sales commence in the US. It will be telling to observe the appetite when large wool volume is offered to the trade.
Dear PMCI customer,
We at PMCI want to wish you a Happy New Year and thank you for your ongoing support.
Over the past years, we have seen a decline in wool producing sheep raised in our major producing area of Texas. As an obvious result, PMCI has experienced a decline in wool and mohair volume as well. We have implemented efforts to reduce overhead in order to maintain a reasonable commission level in marketing your products. Declining volumes force changes in operation.
Starting in January 2022 we will be open to take deliveries only on Tuesday and Wednesday of each week. You can make an appointment for delivery at other times, but appointment must be made at least two days in advance of delivery. We have already reduced office staff to a limited week.
There are only two of us maintaining PMCI operations. So work with us and we can make these changes not disrupt your needs and our obligation to keep operational cost down.
Sincerely,
Ronald Pope
General Manager
Do not forget to file for your Ungraded LDP payment when you receive your 2022 weight tickets.
American Sheep Industry and the Wool Council has developed guidelines and progressive certification levels in the American Wool Assurance (AWA). There are four levels, but the first is a self certification or Level 1. This can be done through the link below. For the next levels you will be reviewed by a Certified AWS evaluator. I have become certified and will be glad to visit with you about what is involved and how to move to the next level. The standards are to increase the marketability and value of you wool clip.
https://www.americanwoolassurance.org/sheepqa/
Wool market has started to improve after many months of inactivity. We are offering wool that was carried over from 2021.
November 20, 2020
The wool market started trending up in mid September with some ups and downs along the way. Your coop has been able to move some wool during this trend, but have hit a snag with key individuals having to quarantine the past few weeks. Plan is to market majority of remaining wool in the coming days.
Shearing season will be here soon. In, preparation you need to make plans on shearing time and crew. Also as important is to plan for proper wool preparation with trained individuals. As the years have past there are fewer people qualified to properly prepare and class wool. It is time for growers to take on this effort by having someone attend a wool school that can then assist in the wool put up. I cannot be at every shearing, but will assist those that attend a school in further training.
https://agrilife.org/sheepandgoat/
https://agrilife.org/sheepandgoat/woolmohair/
https://agrilife.org/sheepandgoat/registration/
TEXAS A&M AGRILIFE WOOL HANDLING AND CLASSING SCHOOL
JANUARY 4-7, 2021
Wool Handling
Wool handling is a two-day course and has a registration fee of $125. Basic training on accepted wool handling to improve commercial marketability of wool. Introductory course will cover how and why to separate specific wool qualities on an individual fleece and fleeces within a flock. Training will include short classroom instruction and shearing shed experience. The objective is to enhance student’s knowledge to assist the wool industry in preparing wool to improve quality.
Wool Classing
The Certified Wool Classing School is a three-day school and has a registration fee of $200. This school is designed to teach proper wool preparation, packaging, and classing techniques to support the US wool industry. Upon satisfactory completion of the course participants will become Level I Certified classer. Students will be taught basic wool science principles, market structure, and domestic and international factors that influence the wool industry to expand the student’s knowledge and understand of proper wool preparation.
January 20, 2021
This is a notice to make you aware that I will not be in the field doing classing this spring of 2021. We still will have equipment that can be used on a fee based system for those that have used in the past. I am available to provide advice or recommendations regarding the preparation and packaging of your wool clip. However, the wool shearing season is fast approaching and we need to start planning now.
Paul Brown is a person that I recommend to be able to properly meet your wool preparation and packaging requirements. I have worked with Paul and I will be available for him to make certain the process is done properly.
His contact information is:
Paul Brown
870-378-8387
Let me know if you have questions.
Best Regards and Happy New Year
Ronald Pope
Dear Wool Industry,
Below is a link with the USDA Commodity Credit Corporation’s newly adjusted 2021 wool loan rates. Today, the ungraded Loan Deficiency Payment (LDP) is 40cents per pound grease, which is a 10cents higher from where it stood for much of 2020 and 30cents higher from the beginning of 2020 at 10cents. The ungraded program was the most widely used LDP this past year and in other periods with low wool prices.
Weekly National Market Price for Wool and Mohair
The American Sheep Industry Association has worked closely with USDA in the past year to revisit rates for the Marketing Assistance Loan (MAL) and the Loan Deficiency Program – and greatly appreciate sUSDA’s efforts to improve the program. Both the MAL and LDP needed adjustments to more closely reflect actual current values and respond to market changes.
Producers should contact their local Farm Service Agency office BEFORE their flock’s wool or pelts are harvested to make plans for the coming year and fill out the necessary paperwork to take advantage of these programs.
For more info on the ASI website: https://www.sheepusa.org/issues-governmentprograms-woolldp
Happy New Year and all the best in 2021.
