America's market share has fallen but North and South America's combined agribusiness power is stronger than ever.

by Eric J. BROOKS

With a little help from China, the US's one-time feed crop export monopoly has been transformed into a Pan American oligopoly.

A quarter century ago in the late 1980s and early 1990s, America provided 90% of the world's soybean exports, and a high proportion of those went to wealthy, developed nations such as the European Union or Japan. According to the USDA, 2013-14 will see America provide just 36.8% of world soybean exports and South America will provide 53.7% world's soybean exports.

But here is the interesting part: North and South America now supply 90.5% of world's soy exports –nearly the same proportion the United States once supplied to the world market.