I. General Information

1. Course Title:
Intro to Farm Commodity Marketing

2. Course Prefix & Number:
FBMT 1170

3. Course Credits and Contact Hours:

Credits: 3

4. Course Description:

This course is designed to introduce students to the various methods and tools to market farm commodities. The students will study types of marketing contracts, cash markets, the roles of brokers and market advisors, and the importance of insurance.

5. Placement Tests Required:

6. Prerequisite Courses:

There are no prerequisites for this course.

9. Co-requisite Courses:

There are no corequisites for this course.

II. Transfer and Articulation

III. Course Purpose

1. Program-Applicable Courses – This course is required for the following program(s):

Name of Program(s)	Program Type
Agricultural Commodities Marketing	Certificate

IV. Learning Outcomes

1. College-Wide Outcomes

College-Wide Outcomes/Competencies	Students will be able to:
Demonstrate oral communication skills	fluidly communicate marketing terms
Demonstrate written communication skills	articulate a marketing plan
Analyze and follow a sequence of operations	sequentially access a marketing decision

2. Course Specific Outcomes - Students will be able to achieve the following measurable goals upon completion of the course:

• Describe the history of commodity markets;
• Identify the influences of supply and demand on prices;
• Identify the law of demand;   
• Identify the law of supply;                 
• List commodities that are traded;      
• Identify market symbols;                   
• List commodity trading exchange;
• List USGIS specifications for commodities; and      
• List your alternative sales tools.                    

V. Topical Outline

Listed below are major areas of content typically covered in this course.

1. Lecture Sessions

1. Cost identification
• Collect data to calculate production costs
• Collect data to calculate storage costs
2. Basic concepts in futures marketing
• Introduction to basis and emphasize its importance
• Introduce farm commodity charting
• Exploring seasonal trends
3. Marketing alternatives and form of sales
• Introduction to hedging contracts
• Introduction to option contracts
• Introduction to forward contracts
• Introduction to cash markets
4. Evaluating marketing services
• Understand the importance of crop insurance in marketing
• Introduction to brokers
• Introduction to market advisors