The rural economy has been bracing for potential hits this year - less income, lower crop prices, and geopolitical events have all been issues for producers. As tough as it has been, economists say the industry has been through worse.
“If we look historically, you know, this year is not great, but by far not the worst year we’ve ever seen. The debt load that we carried into this crop year in the aggregate across farms was lower in part because we had some pretty good years price-wise, but that’s eroding quickly. When you’re losing 3 or $400,000 a year on a farm, it can deteriorate your equity pretty quick,” said Dr. Darren Hudson.
Hudson says younger farmers are likely to carry the largest debt load, and he warns the situation could deteriorate if things do not soon reverse course.
