Here & Now

Kevin Krentz on Drought and the Condition of Wisconsin Crops

Frederica Freyberg:

At the mercy of Mother Nature, farmers without any sort of irrigation are being left high and dry, but some relief is in sight. The US Department of Agriculture declared 27 Wisconsin counties are under a natural disaster designation due to the extended and severe drought conditions. The designation opens up resources to farmers within those counties, including emergency loans. For more on how Wisconsin farmers are faring, we turn to Kevin Krentz, president of the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation. Thanks very much for being here.

Kevin Krentz:

Thank you. Thank you for having me today.

Frederica Freyberg:

So for farmers in counties designated as in extreme drought, is this a total bust for crops at this point?

Kevin Krentz:

No, not necessarily, but there’s definitely a huge amount of stress out there on those crops beginning in early May. This drought really started in early to mid-May, and some of those seeds really had trouble even germinating and coming out of the ground, and that’s affecting the whole growing season, and we have inconsistencies when we’re going through pollination right now, and that’s going to affect yield a great deal.

Frederica Freyberg:

So how would you describe the condition of the corn, soybean and oat crops?

Kevin Krentz:

It’s extremely variable, and I would throw wheat in there as well. A lot of our vegetables are in the Central Sands region. Many of that has the opportunity to be irrigated, but there is some dry land as well, so the vegetables are also part of this, but on the row crop side of it, the corn, the soybeans, the wheat, there’s a lot of inconsistencies across the state. There’s some areas that received timely rains. Maybe not as much as they probably could have, but they received timely rains that really were able to capture some of that and be able to be a decent yield, at least in the wheat crop so far, but there’s many parts of the state that are really struggling.

Frederica Freyberg:

Yeah, for sure. Do most farmers have crop insurance? And does that cover all losses?

Kevin Krentz:

So the crop insurance — yeah, there’s many farmers that do have crop insurance, but it’s expensive to buy to a certain level. So most farmers will cover 65 to 70% of their crop, maybe up to 80%, but when you’re talking about the livestock industry here in Wisconsin, we’ve got to have feed for the cows, so it’s not only being able to sell that crop, it’s being able to have enough feed for your animals at the end of the day.

Frederica Freyberg:

So what are the concerns around that right now?

Kevin Krentz:

Well, again, it comes back to if you can’t raise it, then you have to purchase it, and if this drought is widespread enough, those crops have to be trucked in a longer distance. Now, we do — we are fortunate here in the upper Midwest that the majority of our grains are grown right here in the Midwest, so there should be plenty of grain to feed our livestock. It’s just a matter of some farms won’t be able to produce enough themselves to feed their own livestock so they’ll have to purchase some of that.

Frederica Freyberg:

What does the federal disaster declaration do for farmers in bad straits right now?

Kevin Krentz:

So it gives the ability for some low-cost loans, again, to purchase feed, to be able to cover some of those inputs that we had on planting the crop to begin with, so it covers some of those losses.

Frederica Freyberg:

Will provisions in the state budget for increased funding for crop insurance to include things like help with premiums help off-set costs for producers at all?

Kevin Krentz:

So maintaining — we’re in the midst of a Farm Bill discussion on a federal level and the crop insurance program is part of that, and maintaining a robust crop insurance program is good for everybody. It’s good for farmers to be able to protect their crop, but it’s also good for consumers because essentially that’s feed and food that comes back to us as consumers, and so it’s a food security program as well.

Frederica Freyberg:

So given all that, how important are our major crops to our state’s economy?

Kevin Krentz:

Oh, extremely important. When you’re talking the vegetable side of things, we’re number two in potatoes, number one in cranberries, but corn and soybeans, again, go to feed a lot of our livestock industry. We’re number two in the dairy industry in the nation. Right up there with the beef industry as well. So it’s extremely important for Wisconsin’s economy. We’re $105 billion industry in Wisconsin, and — but the key part of being such a large economic driver is farms support local communities across the state, and when farms struggle, local communities struggle, because even a number of years ago, I did the research on my own farm and found that 62% of my expenses are spent within a 15-mile radius of my farm. So you multiply that by the 60 plus thousand farms across the state and it’s a huge impact on local communities all across.

Frederica Freyberg:

All right. Kevin Krentz, thanks very much.

Kevin Krentz:

Thank you.