Commodities across the board are being taken down by the deepening credit crisis. But energy policy is a big issue in the coming presidential elections.

Energy investor T. Boone Pickens says “natural gas is the fuel of the future.” He also says water will become an increasingly scarce commodity with major implications for the agricultural sector.

Chris Mayer agrees with Pickens. He says once the financial crisis ends natural gas and water stocks will attract big bucks.

Crude oil’s masive one-day climb yesterday resurrected fears over the impact of soaring fuel costs on farming and food prices.

Other factors are at play in the volatile agricultural industry. According to Chris Mayer, “Fertile soil - good dirt - may become more important to land values than oil or minerals in the ground.”

Chris says fertile farmland has been in decline since the 1980s due to urban sprawl and soil erosion. This makes it a lucrative asset. And it makes companies like Cresud (NASDAQ:CRESY), which owns large swathes of farmland in Argentina, a great stock play.

Russia is the world’s biggest country. The CIA’s World Factbook says Russia is 1.8 times the size of the US but only has roughly half the number of citizens. This means plenty of available farm land.

The Daily Reckoning’s Bill Bonner says that, even if only a small portion of this land was managed properly, Russia could transform global food production. And with the current de-collectivization of Russian farm land underway, proper farm management is now possible.

Bill says this spells disaster for the US agriculture sector.

Commodities have been tumbling for more than one month. Energy, metals and agricultural products have dropped by double-digit percentages. This means there are potential technical rebounds on their way and opportunities to take profit for more or less short-term corrections, says Gabriel Andre in The Daily Reckoning Australia. Corn may be one of those opportunities.

High grain prices aren’t just hurting hog farmers, they’re damaging ethanol producers too.

If prices causes ethanol plants in the Midwest to close, it could flood the market with unused corn, says Tom Dyson. Expect to see a big fall in corn prices in the near future…

Even without ethanol plants closing corn prices are already starting to fall…

Stansberry Research’s Tom Dyson has been pushing Taiwanese stocks lately. Now Stansberry’s Ian Davis is tipping another overlooked Asian market: Thailand. Ian is calling it a commodity play. For starters, Thailand is rich in rubber and iron ore — two commodities that nearby China can’t get enough of. Ian recommends investing in Thailand with three special Thai ETFs…

Corn prices could hit $10 a bushel this year, reports MarketWatch.

According to the report: “A large loss of acreage could slash U.S. corn production and push next season’s year-end stocks to the lowest level since just after World War II, some analysts said.” If bad weather continues in July and August, corn prices could rise to $10 a bushel, said Shawn Hackett, president of agriculture futures brokerage Hackett Financial Advisors.”

On Thursday, Jennifer Yousfi told Money Morning readers three ways to profit from record meat and dairy prices — both of which are closely connected to the price of corn.

Midwest floods might not push up corn prices as much as was feared, according to a report released by the US Department of Agriculture on the damage to crops caused by recent Midwest flooding.

According to the report, US farmers will harvest almost 9% less corn this year than last. Offsetting the flood damage is the more than 1 million additional acres of corn planted in March.

Corn futures, which were about $7.60 last week, dropped to about $7.25 yesterday on the Chicago Board of Trade.

Editor’s Note: Daily Reckoning editor Bill Bonner thinks it’s time to get out of the cattle business – why bother with meat when corn prices are sky-high?

Editors Note: At least 29 countries have limited food exports in recent months, according to The New York Times, pushing already record food prices around the world even higher. Could it be time to consider investing in genetically-modified foods?

When it comes to rice, India, Vietnam, China and 11 other countries have limited or banned exports. Fifteen countries, including Pakistan and Bolivia, have capped or halted wheat exports. More than a dozen have limited corn exports. Kazakhstan has restricted exports of sunflower seeds.

The restrictions are making it harder for impoverished importing countries to afford the food they need. The export limits are forcing some of the most vulnerable people, those who rely on relief agencies, to go hungry.

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