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The Mississippi River’s impact on Delta growers in ’22

An ag economist says farmers in the Delta region were hit especially hard by the low levels of the Mississippi River this year.

Kevin McNew is the Chief Economist with Farmers Business Network.

“It’s not to say other areas didn’t see impacts,” he said, “but the deepest and most profound impacts on prices were for those farmers say in Arkansas, Mississippi, and Tennessee.”

He says the river is how Delta growers move their grain.

“We don’t have feed use for them and we don’t have ethanol or processing plants in those regions because they are so heavily tied to export markets,” McNew said. “As a result, farmers there are the most impacted.”

McNew says the abundance of processing facilities helped Midwestern states deal with the impact of river disruptions.