ICYMI: My awesome Ph.D student Aayush Dhakal and I sized up fall storage pressure in the US Corn Belt in an article for farmdoc Daily last week.
Joe Janzen
@jjanzen.bsky.social
Agricultural economist at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. 🇨🇦/🇺🇸. Farmdoc contributor, AJAE and Agricultural Econ associate editor, NCCC-134 co-chair.
Who owns US farmland? Farmdoc has a new tool to visualize foreign interest in US farmland, created by my colleagues Bruce Sherrick and Juo-Han Tsay at the TIAA Center for Farmland Research. Doing this isn't easy, because the numbers are actually very small.
Foreign Ownership of U.S. Agricultural Land - farmdoc daily
Bruce Sherrick and Juo-Han Tsay - Using US land in Farms as the reference, foreign ownership interests amount to 0.67% of the total, and the remaining 99.33% is US owned. Forestland accounts for…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
Just in time for harvest, my latest for farmdoc Daily with students Austin Belman and Esteban Vizcarrondo studies how harvest pressure creates a temporary decline in local corn prices.
This week I had the honor of being invested in a new position: The Clearing Corporation Foundation Endowed Associate Professorship in Derivatives Trading at the University of Illinois. I am extremely thankful to my department and college for entrusting me with this position.
Has the grain industry stopped investing in growth? I got to talk about trends in US grain storage capacity with Chad Moyer from Rural Radio Network. There is a concerning decline in the growth of total US grain storage capacity since 2020 that so far defies a single explanation.
The NCCC-134 Conference is live in the Loop in Chicago! It's two days of compelling research presentations and meaningful knowledge exchange on agricultural commodity markets, price forecasting, and market risk management.
End of spring semester is the season for thesis defenses. We had a great one this week from my Masters student Yu-Chi Wang. Her thesis "The Effects of the Renewable Diesel Boom on the U.S. Soybean Complex: An Equilibrium Displacement Analysis."
Each semester, I bring industry experts to my ACE 427 class on Commodity Price Analysis. Last Friday, we were fortunate to hear from Brian Splitt at AgMarket.net about the practice of technical analysis and the art of making a career change.
Higher corn/soybean prices got support from data in USDA's Plantings and Stocks Reports. Scott Irwin and I broke down the numbers in a post-report webinar, incl. corn use variability, pervasive soybean oil demand effects, and why US corn yields may defy expectations: www.youtube.com/watch?v=_PfF...
Implications of Prospective Plantings and Grain Stocks for Corn and Soybean Market Outlook
In this webinar archive from March 31, 2026, University of Illinois agricultural economists Joe Janzen and Scott Irwin break down the latest USDA Grain Stocks and Prospective Plantings reports. Join…
youtube.com
Scott Irwin and I will be breaking down the latest USDA forecasts for corn and soybean plantings and grain stocks. Numbers are out at 11am CT. We'll be live at 1pm. (I can't speak on an empty stomach!) Register now (for free) and join us! farmdoc.illinois.edu/webinars
Events Archive - farmdoc
The March 31st release of Prospective Plantings and Grain Stocks data by USDA's National Agricultural Statistics Service is typically one of the most consequential data releases for corn and soybean…
farmdoc.illinois.edu
Interested in research on commodity markets, trading, and pricing? We are less than 6 weeks away from the latest iteration of the NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis, Forecasting, and Market Risk Management.
Interested in research on agricultural commodity markets/trading/pricing? We are just 9 weeks away from the latest iteration of the NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis, Forecasting, and Market Risk Management.
My latest for @farmdocdaily: US grain storage capacity growth has stopped after decades of storage growth matching crop production growth. Capacity utilization is up, especially for on-farm storage, with implications for supply chains and future investments. farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2026/02/us-g...
US Grain Storage Capacity Growth Has Stopped - farmdoc daily
Joe Janzen - US grain storage capacity grew parallel to production from 2000-2019 but has stagnated since 2020. Combined with rising production, this led to record 80% on-farm capacity utilization in…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
Each year, students in my graduate class at the University of Illinois write-up their research on agricultural markets for a non-academic audience. Then we share it with the world over the holidays on farmdoc Daily: farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/12/the-...
The Number and Composition of Legal Entities Engaged in Farming: Initial Evidence from FSA Payment Files - farmdoc daily
J.R. Glenn and Joe Janzen - Farm payments are intended to aid farmers by supporting incomes, reducing risk, and achieving conservation goals. However, payments may change farmer behavior in ways that…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
Each year, students in my graduate class at the University of Illinois write-up their research on agricultural markets and prices for a non-academic audience. Then we share it with the world over the holidays on farmdoc Daily: farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/12/can-...
Can China Reduce Soybean Import Demand? Evaluating Soybean Meal Reduction Efforts - farmdoc daily
Jilang Qing and Joe Janzen - China is the world’s largest soybean importer, relying heavily on foreign supplies—primarily from the United States and Brazil—to meet rapidly growing animal feed demand.…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
Each year, students in my graduate class at the University of Illinois write-up their research on agricultural markets and prices for a non-academic audience. Then we share it with the world over the holidays on farmdoc Daily: farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/12/vola...
Each year, students in my graduate class at the University of Illinois write-up their research on agricultural markets and prices for a non-academic audience. Then we share it with the world over the holidays on farmdoc Daily
Winter Oilseeds as a Response to Biofuels Feedstock Demand - farmdoc daily
Jacob Lionberger and Joe Janzen - Winter oilseeds like CoverCress and winter canola can supplement biofuels feedstock supply in the central Corn Belt by utilizing idle land between crop seasons. With…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
Shared my (uncontroversial?) take that US farmers would not benefit from tariffs on Canadian fertilizer. I had fewer thoughts when interviewed on the recently announced ad hoc farm payments. www.theglobeandmail.com/world/us-pol...
U.S. eyes high tariffs on Canadian fertilizer, subsidies for farmers
Agriculture industry has been battered by months of trade war turmoil
theglobeandmail.com
This semester, I had the pleasure of advising a student team from the Department of Ag and Consumer Economics in the CME University Trading Challenge: www.cmegroup.com/events/unive.... Yesterday, we engaged with CME staff and industry experts during the CME Group Day of Market Education in Chicago.
Very cool to see our farmdoc Daily article on farmers' use of futures markets (farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2024/12/risk...) cited by Joe Vaclavik this morning: youtu.be/WY0B3UD9Zhk?.... Data show the majority of grain farms, even large ones, don't have a brokerage account and aren't using futures.
After a successful 2025 edition, the NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis will be back in Chicago, April 20-21, 2026. I'm co-organizing. The deadline to submit presentation proposals is Nov 21: farmdoc.illinois.edu/nccc134/subm... Submit papers now and join us in April!
The farmdoc team at University of Illinois is fortunate to have great partners like FBFM who keep our analysis grounded in real-world data on farm finances and the agricultural economy.
I had the pleasure of speaking to an extraordinary group of state and provincial legislators at the International Legislators Forum in Deadwood, SD: agree.org/2025-interna... I talked about ongoing tariff shock and impacts on agricultural commodity trade. Hard to understate how big a change this is.
My latest for Farmdoc Daily: Are there really 97.3 million corn acres in the US this year? Jason Franken and I use acreage enrolled in Farm Service Agency farm programs to say yes. If anything, the 97.3 million acre guess released last week by USDA is a conservative one.
Yes, There Are a Lot of Corn Acres: Evidence from FSA Acreage Data - farmdoc daily
Jason Franken and Joe Janzen - USDA NASS recently increased 2025 corn planted acreage estimate to 97.3 million acres. Analysis of acreage enrolled in USDA FSA farm programs suggests this may be…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
My latest for @farmdocdaily: How big is the 2025 US corn crop? Or at least, how much of a yield increase is the market currently pricing in to new-crop futures prices? It might not be six bushels more than current USDA estimates, but it's close. farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/07/the-...
The Corn Market Works to Explain Itself - farmdoc daily
Joe Janzen - Despite USDA projections showing low corn ending stocks for 2025/26, new-crop December corn futures remain historically low. Markets are pricing in higher yields than USDA's 181…
farmdocdaily.illinois.edu
I'm here to tell you it's possible to grow bananas in New England in your home. I'm also here to tell you that purely in terms of time/labor it's the dumbest thing I've ever done, and that people who think indoor farming will ever make a major contribution to the global food system are nuts.
"To give a sense of the scale of the inefficiency, analysis we did in the Biden administration gave an example of Walmart’s blockchain usage that was up to 50 million times (not a typo) less efficient, in terms of compute, than a traditional database configuration."
Crytpo: There's just no legit use case for it. But, man, are these bros lobbied up.
Our looonnnggg take on why private digital currencies and the blockchain are an accident going out to happen.
econjared.substack.com
US Amb to Canada, last week: annexation saga is “over”—“Move on. If the Canadians want to keep talking about it—that's their business. I'm not talking about it; Donald Trump is not talking about it. We've got too much on our plate" Trump, today: “They are considering the offer!”
Doing that sports fan thing where I occasionally remember last night's Game 7 and then have to stop what I'm doing to shake my head and go "holy crap, that actually happened".
The 2025 NCCC-134 Conference on Applied Commodity Price Analysis (farmdoc.illinois.edu/nccc134/attend) met this week at the Illini Center in downtown Chicago. We had 54 researchers attending and 25 presentations on new research in commodity markets.
