USA TODAY International Edition
Farmers’ woes grow as rain hurts crops
Harvest delayed, and some could be ruined
Already beset with problems caused by trade wars and low commodity prices, many U.S. farmers are facing yet another challenge: wet, muddy fields keeping them from reaping their fall harvest. “You need a boat to get into some fields,” said Kevin Jarek, a University of Wisconsin Extension agent in Outagamie County, Wisconsin. In many places, the crops look healthy despite too much rain. But even a great field of corn or soybeans, Wis- consin’s most ubiquitous crops, will fall apart if it remains wet for too long. “Some corn and soybeans have been standing in water for over a month. Soybeans are turning black in the field, and corn is falling over. Very depressing,” says a crops report from the Wisconsin counties of Adams and Juneau. Too much rain at harvest time has slowed field work not only in Wisconsin but also in Iowa, Indiana, South Dakota and North Carolina. “We should be harvesting soybeans, but we can’t,” said Bob Roden, a Wisconsin farmer. Following low prices for milk and soybeans, now wet weather at harvest “is just another nail in the coffin” for some farms, Roden said. To some degree, farmers are gamblers. They borrow money in the spring to plant crops, betting the fall harvest will cover their loans and generate a profit. Their livelihood depends on the weather, global commodity prices and other things out of their control. Lower prices in September had a negative effect on how farmers felt about their livelihood, according to a Purdue University-CME Group survey of 400 farmers across the nation. More than half of the farmers surveyed said their farm’s financial condition was worse than a year earlier. A third said they expect their finances will continue to decline over the next 12 months. “The barometer readings have been unusually volatile,” said James Mintert, director of Purdue University’s Center for Commercial Agriculture. Concerns about the ongoing effects of trade conflicts, especially China’s tariffs on U.S. agricultural products, continue to be felt throughout the farm economy, Mintert said. The trade war with China weighs heavily on some farmers because, since early July, China has slapped a 25 percent tariff on U.S. soybeans, among hundreds of other American products. U.S. soybean prices have slid about 30 percent from a year ago. “It’s a losing price for many farmers,” said Kevin McNew, chief economist at Farmer’s Business Network based in California. Recent trade agreements struck with Mexico and Canada brought some hope for U.S. farmers, offering some longterm sales stability, but a deal with China remains elusive. At billions of dollars a year, soybeans are the largest U.S. export to China, which in recent months has been turning to South America for its beans. “It’s really a difficult time for our farmers to go through a trade war,” McNew said. It’s also a tough time for farmers to be stuck with soggy fields that have delayed the harvest and reduced the quality of crops. Agriculture officials have warned feed mill operators and livestock producers to be alert for mold and floodwater contamination in corn, soybeans and forage crops. This is the second straight year that heavy rain has devastated Louisiana’s big soybean crop, with “countless acres” of fields going unharvested, according to agriculture officials in that state. It’s not nearly that bad in Wisconsin, but one crops observer, from Columbia County, put it this way: “Farmers just sitting and waiting is causing more stress to an already tough situation.”