can you believe the punters?, page-5

re: widespread frost damage in wa Alpha the frost is localised ... to WA! LOL Hey noone is predicting the end of the world for the grains industry. I am just telling it how it is. Mate I did a Nuffield Scholarship in 2003 looking at how the Grains Industry was going to cope with rising oil prices. That was when oil was around $30-35/barrel. Travelled to India, Scandinavia, UK and North America. If you want to check it out I even produced a report or I like to think of it as a roadmap for the industry to continue to remain profitable as energy prices begin to inflate. It is at:
www.nuffield.com.au/schreports and just look for Aaron Edmonds - Achieving Profitable and Sustainable Gains in the Grains Industry.

Point is this, the current situation was entirely predictable and so is next years situation. Grain prices, probably closer to the Northern Hemisphere planting season (spring), will rally as the market begins to comprehend that farmers are shying away from grain production or at least the energy expensive rotations. But the rallies will need to be significant to stop the tide. The ball park has changed even with oil at $50/barrel. The main problem is natural gas in the US!There'll be a swing to annual/perennial based pasture systems because they are low input hence low risk. Hell you may even see some major fencing occur in the midwest of the US and Canada.

My experience with those in agribusiness is a little bit of naivity in where we are headed. You guys are there to profit off farmers and so rarely get invovled in directing the future of the industry. And there is a fair bit of naivity in farmers as well granted and by the majority unfortunately.

But what would I know, I am just a 31 year old punk!