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Farm commodities tipped by advisors

Here’s what Moneyweek Magazine (Aug 12 issue) has to say about Yara International:
“The world’s leading producer of artificial fertilisers, with a presence in 120 countries, continues to bloom. It posted a 20% jump in sales to £1.1bn and a 22% increase in operating earnings to £97m in the second quarter as rising energy costs in Europe were off-set by robust fertiliser consumption. This looks set to remain strong over the long term as the global supply of agricultural land is not expanding fast enough to keep up with population growth, and mineral based fertilisers can boost soil productivity fourfold.”
Yara shares are highlighted as a ‘buy’, especially as it has a strong presence in Asia, which now consumes 54% of global fertiliser demand.
Moneyweek also likes Deere, as does TheStreet.com, which see the shares gaining as a result of the energy bill passed by the US Congress which provides big tax breaks for corn growers in the states, whose product is used to to produce ethanol. Moneyweek says this is a huge guarantee that the agricultural boom has much further to go, and John Deere has a second benefit through the booming mining industry, to which it also supplies equipment.

It’s all very foreign to the British farmer, who has seen no boom in agriculture - in fact it’s been recession for 10 years. With increasing quantities of farmland being farmed less intensely, and a proportion still under set-aside, the average farmer in Herefordshire, Yorkshire or in Scotland can only see these reports as coming from another planet.