A historic India-New Zealand Free Trade Agreement (FTA) on December 22, 2025 has provided India’s farmers with preferential treatment. While New Zealand will allow 100% duty-free imports, India will only give market access to 70.03% of imports. However, Delhi has excluded 29.97% of bilateral goods from any duty concession, including ammunition, dairy, sugar, peas, chana and corn,...
Waning global demand has lowered sugar prices to their cheapest point in 4 years, nearly matching crude oil’s related 4.75-year low. On December 22, 2025, raw white sugar was averaging $0.15 a pound in New York’s futures despite advancing by 0.94% day-on-day. Covrig Analytics forecasts a worldwide surplus of 4.2 million tonnes in the 2025-26 season due to Brazil’s...
The high proposed 2026 agriculture budget in the Philippines will leverage market access, boost farmers’ income and lower food prices. Lawmakers are already hailing the 214.39-billion peso ($3.65 billion) budget proposal for the Department of Agriculture (DA) as historic. Senator Francis Pangilinan called the allocation the biggest since 2010, per a Phil News report on December 21,...
A geographical origin certification delay hounds the world’s biggest bergamot orange production center, Reggio di Calabria province in southwest Italy. Ezio Pizzi, Conflagricoltura Reggio Calabria and Coldiretti Reggio Calabria have all objected to giving bergamot the Protected Geographical Indication (IGP/PGI) status. DOP Essence Consortium’s president Ezio Pizzi had in 2001 helped certify the orange with Europe’s Protected Designation of...
January 1, 2026 marks the first time oyster fishers will commercially access Apalachicola Bay on the Western Gulf of Florida since December 2020. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) ended fishing license application on December 16, 2025 after a November 10 start. As reflection of conservation measures for the flailing resource, the FWC even included an online...
A subsidy payment fall out in Greece barring thousands of farmers from receiving European Union (EU) benefits has tossed 3-week protests into major ports. The affected 40,000 livestock keepers and crop growers are taking part in the angry blockading protest, with a minister warning of ‘Grexit.’ By December 17, 2025, highway blockades to the customs points at...
Various boxed beef cuts in the United States traded lower on December 17, 2025 versus a day earlier but prices might generally remain high long-term. Live cattle markets saw futures slip by $0.85 on the 17th versus the 16th, to $230.3 a hundred pounds (cwt). Boxed beef cutouts meanwhile eased due to daily load counts increasing...
A recall of Grandma Belle’s Tomato Basil Soup in 14 states by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has spotlighted processed tomato ingredients. The December 12, 2025 recall declared the product by Lil’ Turtles as likely to contain “undeclared milk” allergic to people with milk sensitivity. Recalls are for the 17-ounce bottle with batch dates...
Despite an acreage decline in 2025 to 85,544 hectares, South Africa expects uptick production of wine grapes in 2026. Industry body, South Africa Wine says it is approaching the coming harvest with “cautious optimism,”per a Sunday World report of December 17, 2025. The association cited private cellar-crop growers’ optimism on the likelihood of a marginally...
Former South American sugar capital, Guyana, is chasing waning production glory by building a white sugar factory in January 2026. The US$20-million Demerara Sugar Refinery Inc (DSRI) at Wales will process a maximum of 100 tonnes per annum. Although only a trickle compared to brown sugar, the additional white sugar will help meet growing demand...