Tools
Historical Ethanol Operating Margins
Historical Ethanol Operating Margins
The return over operating costs is one signal of the level of profitability to producing ethanol. This return is calculated as the difference between the revenues from ethanol plant outputs (ethanol and dried distillers grains with solubles [DDGS]) and the costs of variable production inputs (corn, natural gas, and other costs such as enzymes, labor, electricity and water).
Historical Biodiesel Operating Margins
Historical Biodiesel Operating Margins
CARD is tracking biodiesel returns over operating costs based on a typical continuous flow plant that uses soybean oil as feedstock for biodiesel production. Given soybean oil and biodiesel prices for Iowa reported weekly by the Agricultural Marketing Service, and methanol prices reported monthly by Methanex, we have computed the biodiesel operating returns from April 13, 2007, to the present.
ARC/PLC Payments per Base Acre in Iowa
ARC/PLC Payments per Base Acre in Iowa
This decision tool provides a simple and intuitive way to compare annual ARC-CO and PLC payments for corn and soybean base acres across counties in Iowa. A detailed description of the ARC/PLC programs and other ISU Extension and Outreach Farm Bill decision tools are available on the Iowa State University Extension and Outreach website.
Iowa Cash Rents by Land Quality
Iowa Cash Rents by Land Quality
The cash rental rate information is from a survey of farmers, landowners, agricultural lenders, and professional farm managers. They supplied information based on their best judgments about typical cash rental rates for high, medium, and low quality cropland in their counties, as well as for land devoted to production of hay, oats, and pasture. You can find the original survey on the Iowa State University Extension and Outreach website.
Beef and Pork Price Spreads and Farm Share of Retail Price
Beef and Pork Price Spreads and Farm Share of Retail Price
CARD provides these data as one of many indicators of whether the beef and pork markets are returning to pre-covid levels. For a discussion about these spreads, how they are derived and how they are impacted by marketing costs, see Lusk, Tonsor and Schulz (2020). Beef and Pork Marketing Margins and Price Spreads during COVID-19. Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy. doi.org/10.1002/aepp.13101.
PSI-CARD Corn Yield Prediction Project
PSI-CARD Corn Yield Prediction Project
Corn yield prediction provides valuable information about production and prices prior to harvest. Publicly available high-quality corn yield prediction can help address emergent information asymmetry problems and, in doing so, improve price efficiency in futures markets.
Jiang et al. (2018) developed a Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) model to predict corn yields in ten corn belt states that achieved promising results with the sample data. Overall, the model prediction is only 0.83 bushel per acre (bpa) lower than actual corn yields, a smaller difference than the corresponding prediction from USDA. About 80% of the LSTM county-level corn yield predictions fall within ±20 bpa of actual yields. The model uses ten variables that affect corn yields, which were constructed from data sets provided by the USDA, USDA-NRCS, USDA-NASS, NOAA, and IBM weather underground.
Net Returns Calculator for Cover Crops Terminated with Herbicides
Net Returns Calculator for Cover Crops Terminated with Herbicides
This decision tool is intended to help farmers who do not currently use cover crops evaluate the expected annual net returns to cover crop adoption under alternative scenarios, and to serve as a benchmark for farmers who are already using cover crops and want to improve the return on their investment.
Hog Price and Volume Distribution
Hog Price and Volume Distribution
This tool provides a visual representation of the net price distribution of national daily market hog sales. Multiple dates can be viewed simultaneously for comparisons across time. Swine sales are categorized into five types, as published by USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service. Data used in this tool is publicly available and is derived from the National Daily Direct Hog Prior Day Report - Average Net Price Distribution(LM_HG215).
Evolution of Revealed Comparative Advantage of Key Agricultural Commodities
Evolution of Revealed Comparative Advantage of Key Agricultural Commodities
This figure shows the revealed comparative (dis)advantages of six leading export countries (based on 2019 export values) for five agricultural commodities. The radius of each country’s circle is proportional to its commodity export value in billions of US dollars. Circle positions correspond to relative revealed comparative advantages. The area above the diagonal line indicates a comparative advantage for that commodity/nation and the area below the diagonal line indicates a comparative disadvantage. See the following APR article for more information: The United States’ Competitive Positions in Beef, Corn, Pork, Soy, and Wheat Exports: 1980–2019.
Retired Tools
CARD has some retired tools that may be accessed but are no longer being updated or supported.