News

Mississippi River levels on a gradual decline

Locks and dams are starting to reopen along the Mississippi River following some recent flooding events.

Mike Steenhoek, Executive Director of the Soy Transportation Coalition, tells Brownfield several sites south of Minneapolis/St. Paul and along the Iowa/Illinois border have resumed operations.

“There’s still a few that are remaining to be open,” he said. “That will likely happen in the next couple of days.”

He says the high levels have had a limited impact on grain shipments.

“Our key export window is that September to February time horizon,” Steenhoek said. “This is when our exports, while they still certainly occur, are much more modest.”

But Steenhoek says fertilizer imports have faced some disruptions. “This is a time of the year where we see a lot of northbound shipments of fertilizer via barge, obviously to coincide with the planting season.”

The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) says some areas remain at major flood stage, but the trend line will be at moderate flood stage later this week.