The U.S. Grains Council has stepped up efforts to drum up demand for its ethanol exports across Asia, its officials said, after former top customer China imposed steep import tariffs on the fuel amid the Sino-U.S. trade war, shutting out sales. “China clearly would have been a big market for us if we could address the trade dispute there, but we see Japan, Indonesia, Vietnam and the Philippines as our priority growth markets here,” said Tim Tierney, regional director strategic marketing for ethanol in north Asia on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Petroleum Conference (APPEC), the largest oil industry

Senior government officials, including some in the White House, privately expressed concern that the Trump administration’s nearly $30 billion bailout for farmers needed stronger legal backing, according to multiple people who participated in the planning. As part of the program, the USDA authorized $12 billion in bailout funds last year and another $16 billion this year, and Trump has said more money could be on the way. Several officials in the USDA and other government agencies defended the bailout, noting independent legal experts agree that the administration has wide authority to unilaterally act to help the nation’s farmers in a

USDA recently updated the forecast for farm profitability in 2019 to $88 billion – the highest level since 2014. Despite the projection for higher farm income, many real-time indicators, such as loan delinquency rates, farm bankruptcies, land values and financial ratios, show signs of stress for U.S. agriculture. Financial conditions in U.S. agriculture do not align with USDA’s most recent forecast because many farmers have yet to harvest and sell their crops or livestock, and much of the federal support responsible for the increase in farm income has yet to be distributed. Once these things happen, farmers’ and ranchers’ books

U.S. congressional lawmakers return to work this week with a lengthy agenda of contentious issues and only 41 legislative days left in the year to complete it. Members of the U.S. Senate and House spent the past six weeks vacationing, taking official fact-finding trips and meeting with constituents and financial supporters. They return to Capitol Hill facing pressure from farm groups to ratify the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement and staring at an Oct. 1 deadline to pass a stopgap spending bill and avoid another government shutdown. (The Hill)

China’s soybean imports in August jumped 9.7% from the previous month to hit the highest level in nearly one-and-half-years, customs data showed on Sunday, as some shipments booked earlier cleared customs after a delay. August’s imports of 9.48 million tonnes were up from 8.64 million tonnes in July, and also ahead of 9.15 million tonnes in August last year, according to data from the General Administration of Customs. (Reuters)

The Environmental Protection Agency must take a close look at the effects on endangered species of its 2018 rule setting renewable fuel targets, the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday in a decision that was a victory for environmental groups. The court kept the rule in place but remanded it to EPA in order to determine effects on threatened and endangered species. “EPA concluded that it is impossible to know whether the 2018 rule will affect listed species or critical habitat,” the court said. “That is not the same as determining that the 2018 Rule ‘will not’ affect them.”