Farmers Report on How They Will Market Their 2018 Crop

Oct 09, 2018

While 2018 corn and soybean crops are being harvested at record high yields, prices are still stuck in the basement.

That fact is weighing on farmers and reflected in the latest Farm Journal Pulse Survey, conducted earlier this week.

In the survey, Farm Journal asked farmers what their primary marketing plan is for this year's crops. Of the 672 farmers who responded, 44% of them (294) say they plan to store their crop unpriced on the farm. An additional 13% is storing grain unpriced, off the farm. See full results of the survey in the chart below.

Basically, farmers are deciding to do nothing for now, says Chip Flory, Farm Journal Economist and Host of AgriTalk and AgriTalk After the Bell.

"That's not always a bad decision, as long as they're consciously not doing anything with the crop--that they're not simply procrastinating," he says.

Recent improvements in trade agreements between the U.S., Mexico and Canada, and also South Korea, are main drivers for farmers' decisions to delay marketing. Plus, there is the potential for more trade agreements, Flory notes.

"We're also going to be negotiating a trade agreement with Japan," he predicts. "The goal, Sonny Perdue told me, is to have a TPP-plus (Trans Pacific Partnership) type agreement. India could be next. These could be good templates for trade agreements moving forward."

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Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.