Timely and Inspiring Prophetic Analysis so you can Prepare.

Markets Insider, by Aruni Soni: Beef prices have spiked to a record high recently as a megadrought that slammed the US a few years ago shrank cattle supplies. 

Retail prices hit $8 a pound, topping the previous record of $7.90 during the pandemic, according to a Financial Times analysis of data from the Agriculture Department.

That’s after the southwestern US saw the lowest rainfall it has seen in 1,200 years during the 2020-2021 season, according to a study published last year.

While the historic dry spell has since eased somewhat, inventories of hay are still low and feed costs remain too high for some cattle farmers to afford. The result? A whittled down national herd size that fell to a 61-year low.

Intensifying the high feed costs has been the Russia-Ukraine war that’s pushed up prices of soy, corn and wheat.

All of which ultimately means farmers can support fewer cattle. And that scarcity spells higher beef prices. Unlike hens and pigs who give birth to multiple eggs and piglets a year, heifers give birth to one calf every 12 months.

The impact of the drought, the higher feed costs, and a shrunken cattle supply is expected to have longer term effects in the market.

A rancher in Louisiana told the FT that it’s better to offload cattle than to feed them.

“This drought is an environmental event having a significant impact on the national herd,” she said. “You’re seeing cattle all being sold off heavily . . . and my immediate concern is what does our region and the country’s cattle industry look like six months from now? And 12 months from now, what do our markets look like?”

Prophetic Link:
“We are amid the perils of the last days, and trying times are before us. Everything that can be shaken will be shaken, that those things that cannot be shaken may remain. Drought, famine, pestilence, earthquakes, casualties by sea and land, will multiply. Life will be unsafe anywhere, only as the life is hid with Christ in God. Now, while the angels are holding the four winds, is our opportunity to seek the Lord most earnestly.” Manuscript Releases, Vol. 20, page 285.3.

Source References

• Beef prices hit record high as southwestern US recovers from worst dry spell in 1,200 years