Shrinking Grain Supplies Send Prices Skyward

Jan 27, 2021

Dry weather in key growing regions of the U.S. and South America has hit domestic corn production.

Analysts expect 14.2 billion bushels for the current marketing year, which is 325 million bushels less than projected in December and 1.1 billion bushels below initial projections for the 2020 crop, according to the USDA.

Corn stockpiles also are expected to fall. The USDA projects a decline of about 150 million bushels, which would lower stockpile inventory to 1.55 billion bushels. That is 1.2 billion bushels below last summer’s level. The decline was steeper than what analysts projected, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The shift in inventory led to a sharp rise in prices. On Jan. 12, corn futures rose by the maximum allowed by the Chicago Board of Trade to more than $5.17 per bushel. The price continued upward the following day.

The USDA also cut its soybean stockpile forecast and wheat stockpiles, which similarly caused those commodities to trade at their highest levels since 2014. Soybeans were above the $14 per bushel mark and wheat over $6.60 per bushel in mid-January.

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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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