Farm Industry Trends
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Living With A Wind Turbine in Your Back Yard
Most of the wind turbines located in the United States are probably located on farm land or near farm land. DTN – The Progressive Farmer just posted a recent article on “living in the shadow of wind generators”. This posting had several points regarding putting wind turbines on your land. Some of the key thoughts […]
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Warren Buys Burlington Northern
Growing up on our wheat farm in Walla Walla County in Washington state, we had a small railroad trestle that went over Dry Creek behind our house. The local train would come by in the morning headed to Dayton to pick up freight and then would head back to Walla Walla in the afternoon. Most […]
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Farm Credit Services of America Says 2009 Should be “Respectable Year”
Farm Credit Services of America indicated that setbacks in the swine, dairy and ethanol industries will trim this year’s financial results below the record 2008 results, however, they indicate that 2009 will still be a ‘respectable year’. This means that patronage dividends will be less than the record $60 million in 2008, but possibly more […]
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Machinery Companies Not Doing Good
Several of the farm equipment manufacturers that are publicly traded have recently posted their third quarter earnings. In most cases, these earnings were down from last year’s third quarter and in some cases, the amount was down substantially. Agco’s net income was down about 90 percent. The company blamed their earnings short fall on two […]
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Pay Down Your Debt
Farmers are enjoying fairly low short-term and long-term rates right now (that is assuming you can borrow the money). With the government continuing to pump large amounts of liquidity and stimulus into the economy, it is very difficult to predict that these lower rates will continue to last much longer. Much like, fertilizer, fuel and […]
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Some Fun Facts About Farming
The Agricultural Statistics Board of the United States Department of Agriculture publishes many reports during the year. I find it interesting to review these on a periodic basis (my wife does not seem to think this is much fun). Some of the fun facts that I recently spotted were: Texas is about four times larger […]
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Minnesota Median Farm Income Down 15% in 2008
The University of Minnesota has a Center for Farm Financial Management that performs an survey of farms in Minnesota. In August, they issued their report for 2008. Some of the key findings are as follows: Median net farm income was $90,039 which was down from $105,489 in 2007. This represents an approximate 14.6% decrease. Median net […]
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Federal Reserve Bank Says Land Values are Stabilizing
The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City issued their second quarter report on thier survey of agricultural credit condtions. Some highlights of the report are: 1. Farmland values seem to be stabilizing. The value of farmland in the second quarter was basically unchanged from the second quarter of 2008. Irrigated acreage was slightly higher due […]
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The Five Year Forecast – Is It Better or Worse?
As the global economy turned south a year ago, the Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute at the University of Missouri decided to revise their projections of food prices and production over the next five years. This was done early in the year and many commodity prices have changed direction in the last several months. FAPRI […]
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New Farmers Get a Helping Hand
An article in the Denver Post today and in other papers outlined a program in Iowa that is designed go help young non-farmers become farmers by hooking them up with farmers that are ready to retire. This particular program is located in Iowa at Iowa State University and is headed up by Dave Baker. The program […]