National Hog Farmer
Home > All Topics > Feed Costs

Feed Costs

Swine diet composition has become more diversified as pork producers and swine nutritionists make adjustments to control feed costs while ensuring efficient growth and reproductive performance. The competition rendered by the burgeoning biofuels industry for the dietary mainstays – corn and soybean meal – will continue to challenge producers as they wring full value from all dietary ingredients, including the byproducts generated by those rivals.
Recent Items for Feed Costs
  • Lower Feed Costs Drive Pork Production Higher.
    May 17, 2013
    News

    Lower Feed Costs Drive Pork Production Higher

    U.S. pork production in 2014 is forecast to increase by 2.3%, driven primarily by lower feed costs, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Livestock, Dairy and Poultry Outlook released Thursday. USDA projects that commercial pork production will climb to 24 billion pounds in 2014. Farrowings are expected to rise modestly (almost 1% compared to 2013), accompanied by about a 1% increase in litter rates and higher average dressed weights (about 1% higher than 2013), which altogether are expected to set another pork production record in 2014....More
  • May 14, 2013
    News

    Weather Improves, Planting Progresses

    USDA’s Crop Progress and Condition report for May 13 indicated that 28% of the corn had been planted, compared to 12% last week and 85% for last year, according to Illinois blogger Stu Ellis. This year’s corn planting is the slowest planting pace for this date since the flood year of 1993 when only 27% of the crop was planted. Emergence is at 5% vs. 52% last year and 28% on average. Soybean planting is at 6% complete vs. 43% last year and 24% on average. Only 5% is emerged, compared to 52% last year and 28% for the five year average....More
  • May 10, 2013
    News

    USDA: Record Corn Crop is Still Within Reach

    The May World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report released today by the Agriculture Department shows that a record corn crop is still reachable despite a slow start to planting season, according to American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF) analysts. The report forecasts a corn yield of 158 bushels per acre, implying a record crop of 14.14 billion bushels, up 3.36 billion bushels from 2012 when much of the nation was overtaken by severe drought. The current record corn crop was produced in 2009 at 13.09 billion bushels....More
  • Livestock Groups say the Renewable Fuels Standard negatively impacts them.
    May 2, 2013
    News

    The Need for RFS Reform

    This week the House Energy and Commerce Committee heard comments from livestock and poultry groups indicating that the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) has had a negative impact on their industries....More
  • Apr. 30, 2013
    News

    Researching Alternative Swine Feed Ingredients

      Feed costs for corn and soybean meal skyrocketed following the 2012 drought. University of Illinois researchers investigated alternative sources of calcium (Ca) and phosphorus (P) to reduce those costs. Hans Stein and his research team have developed equations for calculating the concentrations of these minerals in byproducts from the rendering industry....More
  • Apr. 26, 2013
    News

    Pork Production: Is It Up or Down?

    The latest estimates of U.S. beef, pork and poultry production released Thursday afternoon would have you believe that there have been notable reductions in output for all three species. But as Steve Meyer and Len Steiner point out in today’s Daily Livestock Report, the catch is that there was one less marketing day in March 2013 compared to March 2012....More
  • Apr. 25, 2013
    News

    Spring Return to Profitability Appears Possible

    Hog producers should return to profitability this spring because of lower feed prices, although delayed planting could still change that, a Purdue Extension agricultural economist says. Chris Hurt says the animal industries got an unexpected boost from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's grain stocks report at the end of March....More
  • Apr. 23, 2013
    News

    Economist Predicts Bright Future for Pork Producers

      More efficient land use, a stalled demand for corn ethanol and increased demand for meat in developing countries should help boost the livestock industry in coming years, according to a Purdue University agricultural economist. Farzad Taheripour, a research assistant professor of agricultural economics, used Food and Agriculture Organization and U.S. Department of Agriculture data, paired with Purdue's Global Trade Analysis Project model, to guide analysis of global economic issues. ...More
  • Apr. 23, 2013
    News

    Corn Planting Creeps Along

      USDA’s weekly crop progress and condition report was almost a re-run of the prior week, with corn planting progress increasing only from 2% last week to 4% for the latest report, according to blogger Stu Ellis at www.farmgateblog.com....More
  • Apr. 15, 2013
    News

    Livestock Feeders See Better Times Ahead

      While Corn Belt crop producers look back at USDA’s March 28 reports and wonder “what happened here,” livestock feeders are doing “high-fives” with themselves. Although the acreage projection was not unexpected, it forecast the potential for increased production and subsequently lower prices for feedgrains and soybean meal in the next marketing year, says blogger Stu Ellis at http://www.farmgateblog.com....More
More
NationalHogFarmer.com
Related Penton Websites
Copyright © 2013 Penton Media, Inc