Times are tough in rural America, but farmers are poised to weather the storm and are not over-leveraged like they were in the farm crisis of the 1980s, the senior director of CoBank said during the sugar industry’s annual convention in San Diego.
“We are in the fourth year of falling farm incomes…but agriculture is in a good position to handle the volatility,” Terry Barr explained. “The biggest challenges now are the range of uncertainties farmers will have to deal with.”
Barr specifically pointed to trade and farm policy uncertainties and increasing interest rates.
“It’s important to keep some key ingredients of the farm safety net during this transition period,” he said of the current debate in Congress over the 2018 Farm Bill.
For example, risk management tools like crop insurance and strong commodity policies like America’s no-cost sugar policy are essential in giving lenders confidence to extend needed capital to farmers and ranchers.
Source: sugaralliance.org