Finding Financial Success in Uncertain Times

Aug 03, 2021

By Jon LaPorte

The Desire 2 Learn (D2L) course “Finding Financial Success in Uncertain Times” is designed to help producers identify the uncertainties that exist within the farm business and how to achieve financial success through planning for and reacting to that uncertainty. The course provides a roadmap for the journey ahead and helpful information will be available at several stops along the way. 

One of the stops will include gaining an understanding of the importance of farm records in decision-making. Without good records, management decisions are made while viewing only a small part of the whole picture, which can limit the opportunities for success.

Participants will also learn about how to find the farm's cost of production. This will provide a meaningful way for farm managers to make well-informed decisions. Cost of production will lead into a review of break-evens and their connection to marketing strategies which can be useful for several types of decisions, especially marketing.

Lastly, participants will discover how the farm's marketing strategy can be refined with insurance programs. For many farms, this means utilizing features they already pay for with their insurance, but rarely use in the decision-making process.

Source : msu.edu

Video: Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way

Harvest is a week out and the farm picked this week to fall apart. The truck needs a battery, the barn curtain's got a problem, and the corn and beans are telling us we're out of time to get it all fixed.

So it's a full day of wrenching. Tork supervises while I get the truck back running, then we're out at the hog barn where one rusted up part has the whole curtain system hung up. Ladder work, cable work, and a little dad-and-son disagreement about the right way to do it. We close it out walking the fields, shelling beans and checking corn, because whether everything's fixed or not, harvest starts when harvest starts.

Chapters: 00:00 Everything breaks the week before harvest 01:00 Tork supervises while I fix the truck 12:30 Out to the barn to find the curtain problem 14:30 One rusty part hung up the whole curtain 20:00 Running the curtain cable from the ladder 24:00 Walking the beans and corn before harvest 26:30 Wrapping up

We're a 6th generation family farm in southeast Iowa showing the real ups and downs of pig farming and row crop farming. No script, just the work. Subscribe and follow along.

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