Port Issues Highlight Need Of A Reliable Supply Chain For U.S. Farmers

Supply chain issues impacting fertilizer, seed, crop protection products, and even machinery parts, have farmers facing another challenge in growing a crop. Marieta Hauser, member of the American Farm Bureau Women’s Leadership Committee, said the price and availability of products to raise a crop are a big challenge right now.

“It's pretty tough right now with the cost of chemicals that we need to put on the crops, the cost of the seed, everything going up and it's short, we don't know for sure if we can get it. So, it's pretty hard to plan for the future when you don't know what you're able to have available to you. And it affects all areas of our life. It isn't just the farmer, it's all of our rural communities and the big cities as well.”

Hauser said the current climate highlights the need of a reliable supply chain.

“We need to know that we are going to be able to source the things that we need in order to farm. Farming’s a business where we're on a deadline to get the crops in, we’re on a deadline to get the crops out, we've got Mother Nature throwing weather events at us, we need the reliability of knowing the inputs that we need to do business are there.”

Hauser said despite the supply chain issues, farmers are still getting the job done.

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