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Economists find some glimmers of hope in farm economy

Farm Bureau economists see some glimmers of hope in the ag economy in 2017.

Although some grain traders view global grain supplies as burdensome, American Farm Bureau chief economist Bob Young says it wouldn’t take much of a supply disruption to impact markets.

“Here, or the Black Sea, or the South America—something like that—it won’t take much of a supply disruption for prices to move, and move potentially noticeably,” Young says. “Don’t forget, we had those corn prices this fall spike up to about 4.50 a bushel—and that was just a concern about wet weather showing up.”

Iowa Farm Bureau’s director of commodity services Dave Miller thinks the ag economy is “searching for a bottom”.

“I am actually quite optimistic that the first half of ’17 is probably going to be where we find the bottoms in these markets—and it will probably be upward from there,” Miller says.

Miller says the strength of the U.S. dollar is creating some headwinds for exports, but he agrees with Young that the odds are good for a supply disruption somewhere in the world in 2017.

AUDIO: Bob Young

 

AUDIO: Dave Miller