particularly dry in April with England receiving 32 per cent of its normal precipitation – less than a third – and Wales marginally drier with 30 per cent. The second half of the year, with the single exception of October,
could not have been more different. By and large, temperatures were below normal with August and November each down by 0.4°C. What about December? It was, to speak truth, slightly warmer than normal but only to the extent of 0.2°C. England and Wales were the chief beneficiaries with temperatures to the good, respectively, by 0.3°C and 0.5°C. England received 112 per cent of its normal rainfall in December,
a figure regarded by our retiring consultant and researcher as ‘significantly understated’, judging from the rainfall at his Christmas sojourn in his native Cornwall. The UK as a whole received a shade less than normal, this reflected lower than normal precipitation in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Sunshine? In both November and December, the UK as a whole was sunnier than usual with, respectively, 121 per cent and 115 per cent of average sunshine hours for the months in question.
FARMERS BREXIT VIEWS UNCHANGED Support for Brexit remains as strong as ever among British farmers, with few who voted to leave the European Union 18 months ago saying they would vote any differently if there was another referendum today. The latest survey of Farmers Weekly readers, conducted by direct email and online during the first week of December, attracted over 1,400 responses – roughly two-thirds farmers and one-third non-farmers. It revealed that, among farmers, some 53 per cent voted to leave
the EU in the referendum of 23 June 2016, and 45 per cent opted to remain, with 2 per cent not voting.
ECONOMIC CATCH-UP Inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index, was 3.1 per cent in November. It remains the case that inflation has been pushed above the target by the boost to import prices that resulted from the past depreciation of sterling. The Monetary Policy Committee judges that inflation is likely to be close to its peak, and will decline towards the 2
Editor’s Notebook is sponsored by Compound Feed Engineering Ltd
per cent target in the medium term. In line with the procedure set out in the MPC’s remit, the Governor will be writing an open letter to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, accounting for the overshoot relative to the target and ‘explaining the MPC’s policy strategy to return inflation sustainably to the target’. Members of the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee
(MPC) voted unanimously to hold interest rates at its latest meeting on 13 December. The move follows last month’s decision to raise rates by 0.25 percentage points, the first increase in almost ten years. The MPC also voted to keep both corporate and government bond purchases on hold, at £10 billion and £435 billion respectively. After figures published on Wednesday showed inflation had hit 3.1 per cent in November, the MPC has forecast it is close to its peak. However, the minutes of the MPC’s meeting indicated it was unlikely to hike rates again in the foreseeable future thanks to what it described as ‘mixed’ economic data. Nancy Curtin, chief investment officer at Close Brothers Asset Management, commented that it was clear that now was not the time for a further rate rise, adding that the November decision to raise rates from 0.25 per cent to 0.5 per cent may have been ‘too hasty’ given what she said was ‘the strain the economy is under’. The US Federal Reserve raised interest rates by 0.25 per cent at
their last meeting, as anticipated. In her final press conference before ceding her role, Fed chair Janet Yellen said that her colleagues had ‘factored in’ the prospect of tax reform but this wasn’t driving the rate increase.
BASF FORCE MAJEURE Following a fire at its Citral plant in Ludwigshafen BASF has made a Force Majeure declaration for its Citral and Isoprenol-based aroma ingredients as well as for its Vitamin A, E and several Carotenoid products. While starting up the plant in Ludwigshafen after a scheduled
maintenance shutdown, a fire, caused by an equipment failure beyond BASF’s reasonable control, occurred at the site in the late evening of October 31, 2017. BASF said that the reason that it is taking an extended period of time to get the plant up and running is because the fire destroyed key electric components needed to steer production processes. There was only a minor impact on structural components of the plant. Given the complexity of the repairs required, start-up is not anticipated until March this year. There have been complaints about a lack of information
www.cfegroup.com PAGE 18 JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2018 FEED COMPOUNDER
forthcoming from BASF, which may be explained by the difficult path any company declaring Force Majeure has to tread in ensuring that all the messages it puts out are both accurate and available to all customers at the same time. BASF has launched a website, www.
basf.com/citral-plant, which shows its intended schedule in getting the plant back into production, as well as actual progress. It has to be understood, however, that while March of this year is the target for the plant to be back on stream, the knock-on effects impacting on the products used by the feed industry (and BASF has a very large market share in these products) could last considerably longer.
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