I am presently involved in transferring our 2,500-acre cattle and grain farm to two sons, but my greatest fear is that in the present environment they have no chance of making it. The only chance I see is if I give that farm to them, not sell it to them or even a part of it.
I will continue with my brief.
Very few young men and women who grew up on the farm have chosen to remain on the farm as their career choice. Why? Growing up on the farm, they know that farming is a very difficult, low-paying, high-risk, high-investment career choice. Agricultural financial experts tell us that we need a 10,000-acre operation to be financially viable in the present environment. In other words, an investment of $4 million to $6 million, a huge amount of money, must be borrowed from the lending institutions, interest payable.
To operate a modern grain farm requires machinery, fertilizer, herbicides, seed, fuel, rail services, and borrowed capital. These services and goods that we must have and cannot farm without are all controlled by a few transnational corporations who seem to be more powerful than many governments. During the last few decades, these agricultural corporations have amalgamated, consolidated, and bought each other out, to the point at which they almost are able to perform as a monopoly, and often do. Competition between the few agriculture transnational corporations seems to be a thing of the past. For example, two years ago, when world grain supplies plunged to a worrisome low, grain prices to farmers increased substantially. Almost immediately, the suppliers of farm inputs raised their prices, some as much as 400%. As quickly as we gained a much-needed raise for our grain, they took it away from us. They now have the power and ability to do just that.
Farmers are little more than economic slaves for the transnational corporations. Young men and women who grew up on the farm understand and know this. Therefore, they reject farming as a career choice.
Thank you very much.