Top Producer Conference

Yesterday I attended the Tomorrow Top Producer conference in Chicago.  The main Top Producer gets started today and runs through Friday.

Some of the observations from yesterday are:

• Younger producers are very worried about the availability of land to farm.  With cash rents rapidly increasing and land prices exploding, they worry about their ability to acquire the landed needed to economically run their farm.
• The last presentation at the conference may of helped address this problem.  A group of farmers in Northeastern Iowa have banded together to farm.  There are both older and younger farmers in the group and by combining all of the equipment resources into one pool and allocating costs based on the acres farmed, younger farmers can get the benefit of new updated equipment without the capital outlay.  They simply pay the per acre price for the land they farm.
• Brent Gloy from Purdue discussed whether farmland prices are in a bubble right now.  His conclusion is that they are, but who knows when it will POP.

I will post tonight on the activities at the first day of the Top Producer Conference.

Paul Neiffer CPA