DEC NIBJ: Farmers feel the strain of high production costs
A woman stops to admire a rainbow that seemed to rise from the fog at a Kootenai County farm in this 2023 file photo.
Photo by Michael Frederick
Farmers in Kootenai County are feeling the strain of high production costs, despite agriculture’s continued dominance in Idaho’s economy, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
The USDA conducts a Census of Agriculture every five years to gather data from farms across the country, the most recent having been conducted in 2022. A total of 988 Kootenai County farms were included in the 2022 census.
Overall, the census data shows a downsizing in farmland in Kootenai County. As of 2022, there are 107,727 acres of farmland in the county, with the average acreage per farm being 111 acres. These numbers reflect a 23% decrease in farmland countywide since 2017, and a 15% decrease in average farm size. Over half of these farms, according to census data, are 49 acres or less.
The downsizing trend seen in Kootenai County could perhaps be attributed to financial strain—while market value of products sold rose 9% since 2017, so did farm production expenses, which rose by 11%.
According to Sean Ellis, a spokesman for the Idaho Farm Bureau Federation, the trends reflected in the 2022 census data are still largely holding true in 2024.
“While farm production costs have stabilized and even come down a little for certain inputs, they are still near record levels,” Ellis explained. “At the same time, the prices that farmers and ranchers receive for their commodities have decreased significantly over the past couple years. So, while farm input costs have decreased slightly in some cases, they have not decreased enough to offset declining ag commodity prices.”
These factors lead Ellis to predict that the trends that emerged in the 2022 census data will likely continue — at least for now.
“I expect total net farm income, both in the United States and in Idaho, to be down notably this year compared to last year,” Ellis said. “Farming is always a challenge, and agricultural producers face particularly tough financial challenges this year.”
There is some good news — Idaho was ranked first in the country for five different agricultural commodities in 2023, according to the National Agricultural Statistics Service. Idaho is the countries’ top supplier of potatoes, barley, peppermint oil, alfalfa hay and food trout.