Minnesota farmers tightening belts, with ripple effects on the rural economy

Ed McNamara sat in the driver’s seat of his John Deere combine recently, musing about crop prices as he mowed through six rows of corn at a time.

Thousands of Minnesota farmers have withstood stubbornly low crop prices during the past 27 months, and farmers’ average net income has been dropping steadily for the past three years. McNamara, who has been farming just south of the Twin Cities near Goodhue since 1978, has seen the farm economy cycle up and down several times and knows the drill when profit margins are slim to none.

“Tighten your belt, cut back on inputs but don’t hurt your yield, run machinery a little bit longer, and try to get the best deal for supplies,” he said, including seed, fertilizer and other chemicals.

http://www.startribune.com/minnesota-farmers-tightening-belts-with-ripple-effects-on-the-rural-economy/400200251/