An annual report by the Department of Agriculture shows cropland values have remained stable this year. The USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service’s Land Values 2017 Summary shows a slight increase in average farmland value, but cropland value remained unchanged from the previous year. The United States farm real estate value, a measurement of the value of all land and buildings on farms, averaged $3,080 per acre for 2017, up $70 per acre, or 2.3 percent, from 2016 values. The highest farm real estate values were in the Corn Belt region at $6,260 per acre, and the Mountain region had the lowest farm real estate value at $1,130 per acre. In the Southern Plains region, the average cropland value increased 6.0 percent from the previous year. However, in the Northern Plains region, values decreased by 4.4 percent. Also, the United States pasture value increased by $20 per acre from 2016 values.

House Agriculture Chairman Mike Conaway of Texas says he wants to finish the next farm bill this year, with the bill reaching the U.S. House floor for a vote in early 2018. Conaway told a farm bill listening session in California over the weekend that he hopes the farm bill will be on the House floor in the first quarter of 2018. At the end of the session, Conaway noted that writing the farm bill would be challenging because “no one asked for less money,” according to the Hagstrom Report. The listening session is one of many being held by Congress across the nation as lawmakers prepare to write the next farm bill. California farmers asked the House Agriculture Committee during the listening session to strengthen support for specialty crops, among other concerns.

Cargill has reached an agreement to acquire the animal feed business of Southern States Cooperative. Withholding terms of the deal, Cargill released a statement last week saying it expects the transaction to close within 90 days. Cargill says the transaction will better serve its customers in the United States and is part of the company’s Feed and Nutrition’s growth strategy. Under the agreement, Cargill will purchase the assets of Southern States Cooperative’s animal feed business, including seven feed mills and a portfolio of products, brands and customer and supplier relationships. The other segments of Southern States Cooperative’s business – retail, farm supply, energy, and agronomy – are not part of the transaction.

The Port Authority of Houston, Texas and its counterpart in Cuba have signed an agreement of “friendship and commercial cooperation.” The agreement between the two launches an opportunity to “continue trade in agricultural products between the U.S. and Cuba,” according to the Houston Port Authority. The PanAm Post reports that the agreement seeks to facilitate and promote trade, generate new business and foster a “closer” bilateral relationship between the two nations. The agreement also provides for the exchange of studies and information to improve and increase market research, joint marketing activities, training and technological exchange. A port official from Cuba commented on the agreement that “Texas is a state that is rich in agricultural, livestock, industrial development,” adding that Cuba is interested in negotiating and developing a prosperous commercial exchange. The agreement is the eighth signed by Cuba with United States ports, other of which are in Florida and Virginia.

The Environmental Protection Agency will reject proposed changes to the point of obligation for complying with the Renewable Fuel Standard away from refiners. Politico reports that a Trump administration official said the EPA would reject the proposal by billionaire Carl Icahn, a key Trump supporter. EPA plans to formally announce the decision within the next two weeks and “President Trump supports the EPA’s decision.” Politico says that Icahn, refining giant Valero and smaller refiners argued that purchasing compliance credits, called Renewable Identification Numbers, squeezed their bottom lines and, in some cases, threatened to put them out of business. Icahn’s CVR lost $19 million in the second quarter of this year after guessing incorrectly that the administration would make the policy change.

The sponsor of an immigration bill suspected to reduce the agriculture labor force in the U.S. says his legislation will not impact temporary workers, which are often used in agriculture production. Georgia Republican Senator David Perdue wrote colleagues last week after concerns were raised about how the bill would impact farm workers. Referring to comments by Senate Republican Lindsay Graham, that the proposal would hurt his state’s agriculture and tourism industries, Perdue said: “What we’re focused on in this bill is permanent legal immigration — green cards only,” according to the Hagstrom Report. Because of that, Senator Perdue says the Reforming American Immigration for a Strong Economy, or RAISE Act, would not affect programs that bring farm workers into the United States on a temporary basis.

Farmland is one of the most significant assets producers have in their portfolio. Strong land values are critical to maintaining strong equity positions for producers and good collateral for ag lenders in the current economic downturn. An Iowa State University survey results are unclear on where land values are going as signals are mixed. For example, the Iowa State Land Value Survey shows the Iowa farmland market has dropped three years in a row after peaking in 2013. It’s the first three-year drop in Iowa since the 1980s. At the same time, several sources are predicting that the drop in Iowa farmland value has begun to slow. The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago recently reported a two and five percent increase in farmland value for Iowa and Wisconsin, respectively, from April of 2016 to this past April. That’s the first year-over-year increase for Iowa in four years. USDA’s recent Land Value Survey in August of last year showed a modest climb in land values in the Southeast, the Delta region, and the Southern Plains, from June of 2015 to June 2016.

Federal scientists have measured the largest dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico in recent history. The oxygen-depleted area is roughly the size of New Jersey. Politico’s Morning Ag Report says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the increasing dead zone was fed by nutrient pollution washing down the Mississippi River. NOAA says the nutrient runoff comes primarily from farms, as well as urban and suburban runoff. This type of pollution, called “non-point pollution” in the Clean Water Act, is not federally regulated and difficult to control. The nutrients cause massive algae blooms that suck oxygen from the water as they decompose. Scientists studying the problem said that to reach a goal of shrinking the dead zone down to 1,900 miles, runoff from the Mississippi River would have to be cut by 45 percent. A task force formed in 2001 set a goal of reducing the dead zone four and a half times smaller than it is today, missing the goal it set for 2015. The task force now says it will take another twenty years to reach its goals using voluntary, state-led reduction efforts.