BATON ROUGE, La. (RFD-TV) — Higher diesel prices are putting additional pressure on rice and sugarcane growers, with fuel expenses potentially doubling next year if prices remain elevated.
Dr. Michael Deliberto, an agricultural economist at Louisiana State University, says diesel prices holding near $5.34 per gallon could significantly increase production costs for both crops.
“For rice, $124 an acre to $240 an acre; and for sugar cane, about $98 per total farm acre to $191. When you have a near doubling of the fuel price over the growing season, that’s going to impact crops uniformly across the board. You can see rice and sugar cane producers are more adversely affected due to their reliance on that as a critical input.”
Diesel prices have fallen several cents over the past week but remain well above year-ago levels.
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