A sharp uptick in debt, owed by farmers who loaded up on easy credit when commodity prices were high and kept borrowing after grain prices crashed, is raising fears of broader turmoil in U.S. agriculture.
A Reuters analysis of federal data on agricultural lending in Illinois, Indiana and Iowa shows that delinquency rates on farmland and production loans are rising sharply. According to Reuters, the proportion of extremely leveraged grain farmers in the U.S. – those with debts totally more than 71 percent of assets – doubled between 2012 and 2015.
(via Illinois Farm Bureau)
