Midwest soybean farmers are facing an array of compounding issues. Costs, such as equipment, have crept up over time while soybean prices have stayed low.

Soybeans, which are used for livestock feed, food and biofuels, are among the top U.S. agricultural exports. That hasn’t always been the case. Before the 1960s soybeans weren’t a major crop in the U.S, according to Chad Hart, an agricultural economist at Iowa State University. It wasn’t until the 1990s that soybean production accelerated due to international demand — primarily from China — and soybeans and corn are now dominant in U.S. agriculture.

But U.S. soybean farmers, who typically also grow corn, have been facing financial issues for years even before the onset of the Iran war.

Soybean prices have been persistently low in recent years. The global market has been awash in soybeans, driven in part by Brazil, which surpassed the U.S. as the world’s largest soybean producer years ago.

    • suigenerix@lemmy.world
      7·
      3 days ago

      “So much winning!”

      During the first Trump administration, Soybean farmers were hit hard by the tariff war with China, especially in the mid-west. The administration had to bail out the industry with tens of billions of dollars in handouts. Many farmers went under, and there was a clear rise in farmer suicides.

      So what did these farmers do?.. yep, they voted for Trump again for a second term [sigh]

      And after seeing how devastating tarrifs were on farmers and industries, and the deaths it caused the first time around, surely Trump learned a valuable lesson and vowed not to use tarrifs so recklessly in his second term…

      • inclementimmigrant@lemmy.world
        4·
        2 days ago

        You know what pisses me off so much about this too? The tariffs that first term Racist in Chief put on washers to “protect” American multinationals that created crap washers, that triggered China to tell soy famers to F off, resulted in washers AND dryers being increased by 100+ dollars per by BOTH foreign and domestic washers.

        Not only that, it also resulted in American manufacturers still closing plants and shedding jobs by the hundreds while there was a maybe 1K jobs created as the foreign companies basically created a few factories that did final assembly here to avoid taxes.

        The soy bean farmers got hit for literally nothing but raised the cost for US consumers for all washers and dryers because American companies are greedy assholes that just raised their prices to match the tariffed machines and did nothing to improve quality or engineering.

        And then like you said, threw away the soy bean market recovery that Biden got them after smoothing over the stupid, unnecessary trade war that the previous moronic racist put in place by electing moronic racist back into office…