>> Fuel and Fertilizer. The cost of them has spiked due
to the war in Iran that has disrupted crude oil fields
and transport, as well as the export of fertilizer on
farms. In Wisconsin, growers consider their
crops and spring planting in the face of this price
volatility. Wisconsin Farmers Union President
Darin Von Ruden is here with more. He joins us from
Westby. And thanks a lot for being here.
>> Thanks for having me this morning.
>> So what are your farmer members saying about the
price shocks happening right now?
>> Well, lots of concerns. You know, some of our
members actually were able to book their inputs last
fall, so probably aren't going to see that sticker
shock this spring. Like we are amongst other members
that don't have the ability to because of cash flow
problems by that. So they're right now probably
examining, do we stay with corn and need to put more
nitrogen on the ground, or should we look at a, you
know, small grain crop or do we plant more soybeans
just because of that price of fertilizers has
increased so much in the last two weeks here.
>> What are the ways the increased cost of fuel
impact producers? >> Well, in really in all
aspects, number one, it costs more to get the, the
items that we need to produce the crops to the
farm. There are surcharges that are co-ops in process
or our delivery folks will be charging. It's going to
cost more to put the crop in the ground. If. Unless
you were able to book that fuel earlier, which doesn't
happen very often. And then just to get the products
that we produce to the consumer through the
processors and distributors, we're probably going to be
seeing surcharges on those deliveries to.
>> Now. The Trump administration just waved a
100 year old shipping law to speed up oil and
fertilizer shipments ahead of spring planting. How
welcome is that? >> Well, you know, if it
helps in that price of what the cost is to get by that
gallon of diesel or that gallon of gas, you know, it
certainly is welcome news, but I'm hearing that it's
it probably will have very little impact on it because,
you know, planting season is probably two weeks away
in southern Wisconsin here right now. So can that
really impact what's going to happen on day one when
farmers need to be in the fields? Big question mark
there. >> Yeah for sure. So how
how difficult is it to move from corn to soybeans or
other crops? Just kind of on a dime here.
>> The biggest thing is, is the availability of the
seeds. So, you know, farmers generally try to
have that contracted earlier delivery. You know,
at this time of year, those seeds are being delivered
to the farm. So if your supplier has adequate
supplies of both, you're in good shape. But some years
they'll the people that we buy from are trying to
guess what farmers are going to do. And so could
be shorted one or the other. And small grains is another
issue because a lot of suppliers don't necessarily
have large quantities of that seed available. So it
might take 2 to 3 weeks to get that to come in from
another source. >> So even ahead of the war
in Iran, how have Wisconsin farmers weathered tariffs
and resulting markets? >> Yeah, certainly, you
know, last year was not a good year for farmers on
the on the economic side, a lot of farmers posted
losses in corn and soybeans, especially because of that
disruption in the marketplace and not having
those overseas buyers to buy that. You know, we have
weather, a little bit of that with the increased
prices that we've seen. After President Trump
announced some of the trade deals with China, but we
still haven't seen all of those markets come back to
the level that they were two, three years ago.
>> How meaningful have one time payments out of
Washington to offset tariff losses been for farmers in
Wisconsin? >> Well, you know, it
certainly has helped ease some of the pain between
the banker and the farmer because they were able to
pay maybe a bigger portion of the the operating loan
that they had. But in reality, when you look at
the the real numbers, it was only about 15% of what
farmers needed to pay for their production costs. So,
you know, in the end, we're still quite a bit behind on
that process. And, you know, farmers generally want to
receive our income from the marketplace and not depend
on Uncle Sam to send us a check when we're in dire
needs. And so with the trade war that we had, you
know, those market conditions were really
impacted in a negative way. And it's really a
frustration of farmers that we need to depend on the
federal monies to come in in order to pay bills.
>> All right. Darin Von >> All right. Darin Von