In Iowa, Farmers Have Only One Topic of Conversation: Drought
Guardian -- August 31, 2012 -- Flying in to Des Moines, the corn fields look surprisingly green. America's midwest produces half the world's maize and Iowa its biggest harvest, yet amid the worst drought in living memory all the untrained eye can see is the occasional brown mark, like a cigarette burn on the baize of a pool table. Appearances can be deceptive.Farm Progress, the largest agricultural show in the US, is being held this week in Boone, 30 miles from Iowa's capital. Traffic backs up for miles, bringing 200,000 people to the 100-acre site, given over to giant machines that look as if they were built to explore Mars. The drought dominates conversation.
Pam Johnson, first vice-president of the National Corn Growers Association, says she can't remember one as bad in her 40 years of farming. "My parents say you have to go back to the 1930s for anything comparable," she says. In June her farm in northern Iowa got an inch and a half of rain. "We usually get that a week." Rain may be coming soon, thanks to hurricane Isaac, but it's too late for America's corn crop.
The US planted 97m acres of maize this year - the most since 1937. If everything had gone according to plan, the 2012 harvest would have produced a record of almost 15bn bushels of maize (380m tonnes). It's too early to say what the final tally will be but the US department of agriculture has slashed its forecast to 10.8bn bushels.
Dan Basse, president of AgResources, an independent agriculture analyst, says even that figure is likely to come down. "We've lost 4bn bushels of corn, that's the largest loss in history and we could lose another [billion]," he says. The US Department of Agriculture has declared counties in 38 states to be "disaster areas". Some 72% of cattle areas are experiencing drought.
Corn prices are at record highs, suggesting its producers might be among the few winners in this situation. But many sold their crop before the drought swept the country and those with corn to sell now have less of it.
The US is an important exporter of grains, and by the end of the year food prices for the world's consumers are likely to rise, at a time when many households have already been stung by the increasing price of energy.
The rise is unlikely to be enough to ruffle US families. But Basse says those who will feel it most are the 1.7 billion people across the world who get by on $2 a day or less.
In 2008, drought-driven food price rises led to riots and contributed to the Arab spring uprisings.
Things could have been a lot worse this year, says Johnson: bio-tech and agricultural innovations have allowed corn to be produced even during this record drought. Those still greenish fields are only green thanks to bio-engineered corn, she says. "If we were using the seeds my parents had used, we would really be in trouble. Those plants would all have fallen over."
But for the livestock industry, it's not enough. Jeff Erb, a Boone county cattleman who farms a few miles from the show, says he has not witnessed a summer this dry since 1985. "And that was nowhere near as bad," he says. "Temperatures were pushing a hundred for nine, ten days after another. The creeks are dry, the pasture's been gone since June."
Corn costs are $8 (pounds 5) a bushel, double what he paid last year. A large round bail of hay costs $150-$160 - again, double last year's price. And while his costs have soared, there's little chance that cattle farmers will be able to put their prices up. "We have no control at all," he says.
At the show there are dark words about "profiteers" and "speculators" but no one wants to attack their fellow local farmers on the record. In private they are lobbying hard. Arkansas congressman Steve Womack, a Republican, is leading a charge to repeal a law that requires 10% of the US's petrol supply to come from corn-based ethanol - a law that swallows up to 40% of the country's annual corn production. "If something isn't done - and done fast - food prices will soar," he said in a recent statement.
Johnson says this summer was an "aberration". In the long run she believes ethanol is a good bet and will mean cheaper fuel for Americans, something that worries them more than small rises in food prices. But the pressures are mounting.
Willie Vogt, editorial director of Farm Progress, which organises the show, says the big issue now is what happens next. Last year was tough on livestock farmers. This year is tougher still. With supplies dwindling, there is little room for error. "We don't need to be too worried about agriculture this year," he says. "But if we have an other drought next year, you better get a gun."
(c) 2012 Guardian Newspapers Limited.
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