Agricultural Cycles: Livestock Market Assessment and Long Term Prospective (Beef Cattle and Hogs)

In the current economic environment, livestock producers face numerous challenges that place constraints on the ability of this sector of agriculture to sustainably grow and prosper. Some of these factors include rising and volatile input costs, potential for severe equity drain, and broader economic influences. With these and other developing influences bombarding producers, and the likelihood of other challenges arising in the future, stakeholders are left pondering the economic situation facing the industry. Livestock production, like agriculture in general, is a notoriously cyclical industry. Given the livestock sector’s previous runs of prosperity as well as challenging times, it is logical to ask what the future might hold. This paper explores the relationship among supplies, prices and incomes, cost of production, and demand to examine some of the key factors that shape the cyclical pattern in livestock returns.https://lib.dr.iastate.edu/extension_pubs/1096/thumbnail.jp