PEORIA, Ill. – As if farmers didn’t have enough to worry about with the pandemic, soybean prices not being what they could be, and the supply chain situation, there’s one more thing they’ll be keeping an eye on going in to 2022.
Todd Hultman, a market analyst with DTN, says it’s fertilizer.
“Those prices are very expensive this year,” said Hultman. “We had natural gas problems earlier this year. Natural gas is still fairly expensive. But, overall, the production and transportation of fertilizer is a real big challenge this year.”
Hultman says natural gas and propane costs can affect farmers in other ways as well.
“In addition to the fertilizer, [natural gas] might run their pivots, or it’s also related to the propane costs you might have in the fall, especially when you have a wetter harvest like you did this year and you have to dry corn,” said Hultman. “Those are all — natural gas and propane — are all kind of related to each other.”
In other words, Hultman says, it all can impact a farmer’s bottom line, at a time when, on the down side, soybean prices are off their highs, but Illinois farmers bested other states in the harvest of corn.
And, Hultman says, you never really know what weather is going to do.
