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Biggest farming issue???

J

JL Ray

Member
Just wondering????? What is the number 1 issue that hurts todays farmer? EX: Size of equipment? Time? Cost of equipment? Cost of seed? Cost of fuel? Help? Cost of help? Insurance? Cost of ground? Getting Ground? Cost of upkeep?
What is it that holds you back? Not looking for three page letter answers, just a word or two.
 
When your questions are 3 or more words (and there is several), it's hard to answer with a one word answer and have it be meaningful...
 
I'm not a farmer but I would say money. The small farmer with an old established farm has a hard time keeping going having to compete with these large corporate farms. It's like any other manufacturing business, with money you can reduce production costs.
 
(quoted from post at 05:27:54 02/08/18) Just wondering????? What is the number 1 issue that hurts todays farmer? EX: Size of equipment? Time? Cost of equipment? Cost of seed? Cost of fuel? Help? Cost of help? Insurance? Cost of ground? Getting Ground? Cost of upkeep?
What is it that holds you back? Not looking for three page letter answers, just a word or two.
Click to expand...


#1 problem - Ego.


The desire to get bigger. Easy credit when times are good to get bigger, followed by impossible credit when times are bad. A tax code that encourages getting bigger. Bankruptcy rules that seem to allow for ripping people off then continuing to get bigger.

Why get bigger? Big owners with 20 employees aren't farmers anymore, they're factory managers. Complain about the taxes, complain about the quality of help, complain about the commodity prices, bust up the roads with overloaded trucks and big equipment, then complain about the roads, etc. Doesn't seem like any way to have fun.

Local BTO is in bankruptcy again. He had to wait for a judge to allow him to plant last year. He sold off 2000 holstien steers 2 weeks ago, and I don't think it was his idea. His pigs supposedly got repossessed. He was up to over 20,000 acres, last year, below 15,000 this year, and it seems like he won't make it through this year. How many small time farmers were knocked out by him and his predecessor that would still be farming today? Funny how lil' old me can make a go with 360 acres, 180 tillable, and leave no one with a bad debt, but he can run around and rip everyone off.
 
Having to compete with larger farming operations that are financed and supported by the Gov't.Get the Gov't out of farming cut out subsidies,ethanol mandate,price supports,Federally
supported crop insurance etc etc.That would put everyone on equal footing.There'd be no more monoculture farms growing thousands of acres of one crop,production would lower,prices would
rise.
 
Exactly and all 8 dollar per bushel corn several years ago did was encourage a lot of production outside of US borders that is not going away. The younger generations are not consuming milk like the previous ones.
 
first thing is HELP, THERE ISNT ANY GOOD HELP TO GET no one wante to work, or knows how to do anything or around here anyway, second equipment is hard to find used afordible any way and verry high priced third we sell our cattle for what thay want to give us, when i go to get farm supplies i pay what thay want whats fair here?
 
There are problems, and there always will
be problems with agriculture. It is a
commodity-driven business, which means
operations work on thin margins. There are
always people and farms entering and
exiting. Issues we face include any number
of things- from trade policy to cost of
inputs in relation to revenue.

Having said that, I don't feel like
anything is holding me back. I run a
cow/calf herd of cows with my dad, and we
raise small grains and row crops. Our
calves are finished with home-grown feed.
Things are run much like they were many
years ago, but we make a good living and
are happy.
 
Not "Fear" per se of the unknown, but the unknown none the less, mainly weather first, market second. For BTOs with lots of
investments in what to grow and how much on an annual basis, even being a STO as I am, I can understand the hesitation in making a
decision. I'm there right now in figuring what I'll plant this spring. Seed I thought I'd be paying $40 a bag is now $95.
 
Intense competition for land resources. High cost of entry into production agriculture. Low return on investment. Large scale operations have some significant competitive advantage over smaller scale operations.

The stage has been set again for a repeat of "debt forgiveness/debt restructuring" for BTO's, as was the case in the 1980's, and for some of the same operations!
 
Entry and improvement costs.....lots of young fellows around here would make good
farmers, but just can't get started or improve/expand enough to be full time. Gotta
wait til dad quits or get a REAL good off farm job.
Ben
 
I would say cost of entry and tight margins.

Easiest way is to marry into it, find a farmers daughter with no siblings.
 
Around this area getting a "real good" off farm job is extremely difficult as this area peaked almost 40 years ago economically. There are more minimum wage jobs around than previously and if all you need for the off farm job to do is put food on the table and have transportation it will do that. To find a job that will buy land and equipment is pretty much impossible. No wonder drugs are a huge problem with some young people. Not everybody is cut out to be a doctor, lawyer, or engineer so it has to be depressing that the thing you are best suited for you can't do due to the entry costs.
 
Gotta say nature. How soon I start taking my Social Security depends entirely on what the weather does over the next couple of years.
 
Easier said than done. When I was young during the 1980's just about every girl wanted to get away from the family farm and a lot of the time it had nothing to do with the crash of the early 1980's. Most young women just did not want to be farm wives and with more women going to college and becoming white collar professionals it was hard to be content on the farm. Further, not everybody came from an operation that did well during the 1970's so many girls never saw the "good times" that were suppose to be the 1970's. Also, many grew up in an environment where dad barked and mom plus the kids jumped. Turning 18 was independence day for most farm girls turned women.
 
Here is a bit of an interesting read on production agriculture. Not anything all that "riveting," but interesting on how and where agriculture fits into the economic model.

https://www.ag.ndsu.edu/aglawandmanagement/agmgmt/coursematerials/competition
 
That's all I got to say about this.---Forest and Tee
a256349.jpg
 
When I started farming in the late '70's, most farmers around me considered you a BTO if you farmed 800 to 1000 acres. There were about 10 farmers, then, that fit that bill. The rest, about 150, worked from 40 to 700 with most around 300 acres. It was virtually impossible to rent or buy an acre of land anywhere in my area then. This lasted up into the '90's and by then most small time farmers were out. Today there are about 8 BTO's in the area, and NO small (less than 1500acres)farmers at all. Now the BTO's work from 3500 to 10,000 acres with some driving up to 100 miles away to farm rented land (usually a 1000+ acre block). In this part of the country, the way the system is set up now, no one could farm a 200 acre farm. The choices are either rent it out to a BTO or plant it in CRP. I'm just speaking for the area around me.
 
It's this notion that there's "competition."

Farmers think they need to compete with each other to have the biggest equipment, the most land, the highest production numbers, etc..

What this does is glut the market with commodity items, and drive the price down. Farmers are their own worst enemy.

When the price of oil goes down, oil sheiks get together and resolve to cut production. The result is the price goes up.

When the price of corn goes down, farmers give their fellow farmers the "stinkeye," plow more land, plant higher populations, spread more fertilizer, and spray more spray to increase yields. The result is the price goes down even further.
 
Around here the biggest man-made problem is land cost. Real estate investors (speculators) drive up the cost of land well beyond a reasonable ROI compared to its ag production capability.

Even BTO's who are renting land become serfs in this game of neo-feudalism.
 
If we are going to only use two words:

Productivity, and Prices. If you are a wage earner, think of productivity as how many hours you work per week. Productivity (like bu per acre, lbs of milk per cow,
lbs of beef marketed) is somewhat governed by weather, but also in how much we adapt to the weather. Tools like drain tile or irrigation can take out a lot of
extremes on crop production. Better barns and animal comfort take out the strain on animals.

Prices. For the hourly wage earner this is your wage per hour. All commodity prices have been lowered significantly in the past few years, so all farmers are working
for a somewhat lower wage. That price pullback is due to greater supply, and less foreign demand, mostly due to good production around the world, a higher US dollar
than we had in the past decade, and frankly, trade disputes due to politics.
 
Look at the European farmers. They are still small and make money. I would say it's because they didn't let corporations get
involved to make profits for someone who does nothing.
 
(quoted from post at 08:53:57 02/08/18) Around here the biggest man-made problem is land cost. Real estate investors (speculators) drive up the cost of land well beyond a reasonable ROI compared to its ag production capability.

Even BTO's who are renting land become serfs in this game of neo-feudalism.
Click to expand...

They do have a choice: Don't buy/rent the land.

If it doesn't pencil out, it makes absolutely no sense to buy or rent that piece of land. Sure the next guy will snap it up, but who's the idiot in that situation?

This goes back to that notion of "competition." Snatch that land up no matter the cost to keep the other guy from getting it... Stupid.

If farmers would quit thinking of the neighbor as the "enemy" and just did what made sense, things would be a whole lot different.
 
I work a regular full time job in town, but I am a "weekend warrior" on the family farm. A long time family friend of mine had a half section of great farm ground and had asked me if I wanted to rent it some years ago. I respectfully declined at the time, because I had to commit a career change. Our friend had always told me that when the time came I wanted to rent it, it was mine. Our friend died, and a sibling ended up inheriting the land. This sibling knows nothing about farming, and I am tapped into for my knowledge. I have been asked the question a couple times if I was interested in renting it. I have communicated that when I am done with my career, and want to start my early retirement job in farming, I will be interested. I know what the cash rent is at this time, and for the most part, all I can see is "red ink." I was asked by the heir, why would the tenant be willing to come up with high cash rent? I responded by informing him, the tenant does have, our could have, a pretty substantial "war chest" of money built up from the lead up to the peak in 2012 and from a year or two after, and at this time, this tenant, who had lost some strategic pieces of farm ground around that time is willing to lose some, or break even at best, to maintain control of this farm. I also shared the tenant has invested into a swine barn nearby, where the manure comes from for fertilizing the crops. I concluded by telling, the heir, if I were to take on this tract, not have access to the manure, and paid the high cash rent, at best and under high yield conditions, I would break even or make a small amount, but under less than ideal weather conditions and reduced yields, I would lose money, and I am not interested in "bleeding money" now. My last comment was, "When your tenant can no longer afford to pay this ridiculous rent, I am willing to talk. I am fine seeing your tenant lose money, and you maintaining your income at this level, but realize, you are going to see this level of income drop sometime soon."
 
1. We are in the cycle of coming off high grain prices, and so everything is inverted now. Seed, chemical, iron, advisory folk, land owners are
also used to high Ag prices, and are not dropping their prices as rapidly as crop prices are dropping. We need these cycles to get back in step.

2. Technology is making farming easier, and more precise, and able to ensure more predictable income per acre. However that technology
costs, and costs a lot. It is terribly expensive on a 750 acre or smaller farm; and much less cost per acre or per bu on a 3000 acre or bigger
farm. Since the technology gives the most best return these days, it is making the big bigger, and squeezing the small out.

It's all much more complex than that, but I agree a short answer is best and those are the 2 issues in a simple nutshell.
 
I admire your courage in being so open when the subject is renting ground. Honesty often gets you taken off the will call list of many potential landlords.
 
Corporations have nothing to do with it. Europeans farmers have been heavily government subsidized for years
 
I agree. Not so much now, but several years ago, around here, the bigger the farmer the more successful he was thought to be. His debt didn't enter the equation.
 
I am a small time farmer and have no problem competing against the so called ?BTO??s. Their input costs are the same as mine. The only advantage they have is the cost of land. They are able to pay more than me whether rented or purchased.
 
Cost of everything . And Americans idea that we
must have the cheapest food possible then they
wonder why the government has to subsidize
farmers
 
NY 986 your seeing the results of years of more government control/regulation in NY. There are few businesses left there. I can not remember the last time I bought anything I knew was made in NY. Even the ports at NY city are not doing as much either.
 
It's not just that but the state does not help things. This area was reliant on old technology companies such as Kodak which refused to adapt to new technology. My mother's uncles worked there back in the glory years of the 1950's through 1970's and many engineers advised top management of changes in the imaging business but the accountants and execs insisted on riding the film business until it went belly up. Kodak today is an embarrassment to those earlier workers. Then ineptness such as Xerox of where my wife's father and his brother (who created nearly a dozen patented ideas for Xerox) which never saw value in products it developed such as the computer mouse and let other companies steal or refine Xerox ideas. Archie McCardell who many IH devotees will recognize was CEO at Xerox before he went to IH. He was a part of the culture there that embraced inflexibility and arrogance on product warranties. The attitude was "too bad you don't like it but what are you going to do about it." Then the Seneca Army Depot downsized during the 1980's and nothing is left there now for jobs other than some security jobs. New things have come in but they have been lower wage jobs if not minimum wage jobs. Some new car dealerships have left or closed and have been replaced by 5,000 dollar or less used car lots. The only ones building new homes are the Amish and a few public assistance apartment buildings have gone up. It's not uncommon to drive down a street (not very long) and see a half dozen homes with for sale signs out front. Oh, and the new casino barely open for a year now recently received a negative rating for its debt servicing ability from Moody's.

I don't disagree with anybody that says its about being positive and setting goals but some days it is pretty darn bleak around here never mind what is going on with agriculture.
 
You are in some ways right, JD, but having lived for 4 years near where NY 986 is, I can tell you that is NOT the whole story.

I really can't say NY is that much more difficult from a regulation standpoint as anywhere in the Midwest. From an environmental standpoint, a CAFO has a lot more hoops to jump through in WI than NY.

Some of it is just a lack of profitable natural resources as a base. Remember, much of the Midwest was settled by people leaving the Northeast looking for better land, and better opportunity. John Deere was one of those, leaving Vermont to come to IL. There are many, many towns in Illinois, Iowa, WI, etc that have the same name as some in NY. Think Waterloo IA is named after Waterloo, France or by settlers from Waterloo, NY? How about Aurora, IL? Or Batavia or Albion?

Farming there was always a bit tougher than the Midwest... whether in 1850, 1950, or 2010. Land was not as productive, and off farm jobs weren't as easy to find, as manufacturing started to leave early on, or just was never there to begin with in the way it was in say IL. NY was past the agricultural frontier when manufacturing really took off in the US in the last half of the 1800's. On the other hand, ag was going gangbusters around Milwaukee, Chicago and the Quad Cities at a time the roots of Allis Chalmers, IH, and Deere were getting going. Or countless others- Milwaukee had Hanrishfeger, Falk, Briggs, Harley, etc.

Central NY was a long way from steel, coal, consistent arable land, etc. Yes PA had many of those, but the topography really limited a lot of shipment, especially in the early days. It was much easier to transport that stuff on the great lakes than across the Endless Mountains.

When I was there, there still was manufacturing in NY- Kodak and Corningware come to mind, as does Byron sweet corn equipment. Byron had a plant near me, too, and closed it to go just to Western NY if I remember correctly. Are they still in business??? But there were many closed plants, too- Borg Warner in Ithaca and Ithaca gun come to mind.

So it comes down to a lot of factors... politics is one, but definitely not all. I agree I have to really think about when I last bought something from NY... but that holds true of Oklahoma and Utah, too.

NY 986 or others from the Empire State, hope I didn't step on toes, but was just sharing observations.
 
Central and Western NY would have never developed if not for the Erie Canal and the separate advent of water power from the Niagara and Genesee Rivers. The Erie Canal being pretty much at level made it practical to replace barges with the railroads. Had someone such as George Eastman been born elsewhere it would have been unlikely that a huge industrial concern such as Kodak would have sprouted in Rochester due to distance of materials. Had there not been hyrdo-electric from Niagara Falls Buffalo would have never seen a lot of the industry that came during the first half of the 20th Century.
 
Must be some more of that fake news. I've seen several stories on the television about the plight of the mom and pop farmer.
 
The Biggest Farming Issues whatever they might be , Could Be eased . We Need MORE Farmers in Politics at ALL LEVELS. including the school boards.or at the very least we should elect those with agrarian roots and Farm Family background. If AMERICA would Do That. So many of this country's festered boils and ills will cure up quickly and heal up well and strong . Rural
citizens have quality leadership skills , and are known for hardwork and common sense. Some of you here exhibit fine skills and should run for office and help RIGHT the wrongs.
 
Well, the current owner of the land has only me who can have a frank conversation about that tract of land. His sibling, who originally had the land, was essentially family to me, my parents, and my own wife and kids. He does respect that long term history and relationship I had with his sibling. I also was quite candid about some of the "games" his tenants had tried playing with me just 15 years ago, with threats to my livelihood. The tenants had no idea I even knew their landlord. Let's just say the "threat" from their landlord truly trumped the threats they lobbed at me.
 
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