According to AgCountry Farm Credit Services Executive Vice President of Business Development Mark Vetter, interest rates will remain a challenge in the year ahead. Inflation has also impacted nearly every line item on the expense side of a farm income statement. As an example, some farms have seen land rents increase 30 percent, and the cost to own land has gone up 34 percent over the past four years. Despite that, Vetter says AgCountry’s portfolio, as a whole, remains in a strong position. “Less than five percent of producers would be objectively experiencing financial stress today, and that’s attributed to great planning and strategies by these operations during the boom years. There was a lot of working capital, a lot of liquidity that was built up in 2021, 2022, 2023 that has propped up producers when you look at them objectively on a credit spectrum.” Watch the Vetter interview.
