News
Higher grain prices impact diversified Minnesota farm in number of ways
Higher grain prices are changing the outlook on farms across the country.
John Anderson grows corn, sugarbeets, kidney beans, wheat, canning corn, a few soybeans, raises cattle, and runs a 2,500 head farrow-to-finish swine operation near Belgrade in central Minnesota.
“Higher grain prices generally bring higher pork and beef prices, it’s just a little bit of a lag. Being a diverse family farm, we like to see higher priced corn to a certain degree. I think the $7 corn we saw in 2012 came back to bite us pretty well.”
He tells Brownfield farmers responded to $7 corn by planting more acres, which drove up land rents, input costs, and the price of equipment.
“It all kind of gets a little more expensive when the price and value of corn (goes up).”
Anderson, who currently serves as president of the Minnesota Pork Producers Association, says it is nice to make money on more things than just hogs once in a while.
