Farmers frustrated with high yields, low prices

Farmers throughout eastern Iowa are experiencing solid yields this fall, but that doesn’t mean they are expecting solid profits.

Economic turmoil in the ag industry – marked by plunging commodity prices and high input costs largely fueled by global trade instability – is a dark cloud hanging over their heads.  

Tanner Fellinger, a fifth-generation producer who lives northeast of Monticello, said farming feels uncertain given the ag economy right now.

“We ride the tide up and down. You do of all this work and sometimes you’re like, ‘Wow, we did all this work and for what?’” he said, noting the low prices for soybeans.

Once farmers factor in their input costs, it’s hard to pencil out a profit, said Chad Hart, an ag economist with Iowa State University. 

Fellinger can attest to that.

“It’s not good,” he said. “Beans are worth like zero.”

Historically, China has been the largest buyer of U.S. soybeans, but steep tariffs put in place by the Trump administration this year have drastically reduced those sales.

From January through August, U.S. soybean exports to China totaled just 218 million bushels, down sharply from 985 million bushels during the same period in 2024, when China purchased about half of all U.S. soybean exports, noted Faith Parum, an economist for the American Farm Bureau Federation in an October report.

During June, July and August, the U.S. shipped virtually no soybeans to China, and China has not purchased any new-crop soybeans for the upcoming marketing year. That’s paving the way for other countries, such as Brazil and Argentina, to capture that market.

Tom Adam, the president of the Iowa Soybean Association, said in a column widely released earlier this month that “the mood in rural Iowa – and across much of farm country – is one of anxiousness and frustration. Normally, those feelings are tied to weather delays that slow harvest.”

That’s not the case this year, he said. 

“No, what has farmers and the businesses that support us on edge is not the weather, but trade policy that’s severely straining relationships with key markets for the crops we produce,” he said.

Trade issues are top of mind as local farmers forge ahead with their crops out, said Skott Gent, who farms in Jackson and Jones counties.

“Trade is obviously hurting soybean demand,” he said, adding that tariffs are driving up the price of inputs, such as fertilizer, that are imported.

He finished picking beans the weekend before last, doing five to 10 bushels an acre better than the previous year. 

He is just getting started on corn.

“The corn is dryer than normal for this time of year, so we’re seeing more loss at the head of the combine,” said Gent, who also works as an agronomist. 

Farmers are also grappling with several corn diseases, such as Southern rust, which thrives in the hot, wet conditions the area saw in July and August.

“Southern rust was pretty bad,” Gent said. While fungicides work well against the disease, it only works so long.

Tar spot likes more moderate temperatures. “When it cooled in late August, the tar spot took over,” he said.

In his years as an agronomist, Gent said he’s never seen so many diseases in so many fields of the 175 operators with whom he works.

Zac Brauer, who farms in Clinton and Jackson counties with his father, Bill Brauer, said harvesting is on track with last year.

“Yields are decent,” he said, but he is also seeing some of the same diseases Gent mentioned, particularly Southern rust and tar spot.

“Overall, the corn is pretty good, but our expectations were extremely high this year,” he said. “The kernels are definitely out there, but the test weight is lower due to the plant dying early.”

While official government statistics on crop progress aren’t available due to the federal government shutdown, farmers seem to be on schedule with harvest, said Mike Naig, secretary of the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship (IDALS).

His comments came with IDALS weekly weather summary.

Information from the Iowa Crop Progress and Condition Report is usually released weekly by the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Agricultural Statistics Service from April through November, but it was not available due to the federal government shutdown.

“Based on the crop progress reports published over the past five years, Iowa farmers typically have about two-thirds of the soybeans and one-third of the corn harvested statewide by mid-October. As I’ve visited with farmers, driven through rural parts of the state, and spent several days in the field on our family farm in northwest Iowa, it seems that harvest is about where we’d expect this time of year,” Naig said. “Looking ahead, rain chances remain in the forecast through the end of the month. Farmers will continue to push forward with harvest, cover crop seeding and other field work as the weather allows.”

Monticello Express Editor Nick Joos contributed to this report.