"We Need a Farm Bill"

Joining us now is John Bartman, fifth generation farmer. He farms corn and soybean in Illinois. Great to see you, John. And I want to start with fertilizer. Chrystia Freeland, they're saying it's about 25 percent of the cost for farmers. Walk us through how much in broad strokes you're paying for fertilizer each year and what's changed, if anything, over the course of the last four or five weeks. Well, David, first of all, I just want everybody to understand that standing behind me, I have two fertilizer tanks. And those fertilizer tanks hold liquid urea, which is 32 percent the industry standard. And last year, by the way, that's enough to plant 100 acres of corn. And last year, that cost me $11,000 to fill those tanks. Two weeks ago, it was $17,000. And now today it's close to $21,000 and climbing. Do you have what you need to start the season? I know it's not just how much it's costing, but whether or not it's going to get to you guys. And that is an excellent point. And that is the $64,000 question. I know a lot of people have prepaid for their fertilizer, but are you going to get it? And the analogy I've been telling people, it was very similar to if your kid had a video game that they really wanted for Christmas and you ordered it in October and COVID happened, were you going to get that game or not in time? Same thing, what we're dealing with right now with fertilizer. You bring up COVID and I think of all the supply chain disruptions that happened then. Was it anything analogous to what we're seeing now? Was it hard to get that urea fertilizer then? Or is this something that's novel, something you haven't experienced before as a farmer? It's getting worse. And I think what people also need to understand is that at least 20% of the demand for fertilizer now is due to Trump's first trade war. Because during that time period, Brazil massively increased their acreage. They went from 80 million acres to up to 120 million acres of soybeans. And now they're planting over 50 million acres of corn. They were never in that category before. And not to mention their soil isn't as fertile as ours here in the Midwest. So they need more fertilizer and not to mention many areas of Brazil, they have year-round growing seasons. So that fertilizer is going nonstop and we're in a world market right now. And we need to be aware of that. And we as farmers in the collateral damage here in Illinois and the rest of the United States. We have some sound from the president from last night on the farm bill. I want you to take a listen to. Thanks to our trade deals, you're now sending over $40 billion in American soybeans to China. I want to thank President Xi of China because we had a deal at 20 and I said, could you do me a favor? It's a big place. Could you double it? And he said, what are you talking about? I said, could you make it 40 instead of 20? And he overrode all of his people. He said, all right, I'll do it. And you got 40 instead of 20. So now you go out and buy bigger tractors. What can I tell you? I'm also asking Congress to quickly pass the new farm bill. And today I'm promising to request additional farm relief for our great patriots and the next funding bill. So we have you taken care of in both instances and we're pushing very hard for the new farm bill. Is there anything in that farm bill that you think is going to help? Will it help? And do you think it'll pass? Well, he also said yesterday too, that I gave you $12 billion and you farmers are making so much money right now. Yeah. How's that going? You know, so, and not to mention that we're still waiting for the supposedly 8 million metric tons that China was going to buy again this month too. It's who knows what the guy is going to say next. And it's just very, very unfortunate. The situation that we're in and we're in another man-made crisis caused by Donald Trump right now. And it's just, just frustrating. We need a farm bill. I think the Republicans are very nervous about getting a farm bill passed. They want to get it passed because they don't want to open up the Pandora's box of dealing with the SNAP program again, which they ripped out through the big, beautiful bill. And there were other wonderful conservation programs that aren't funded like they used to be. I'd much rather be talking with you guys today about carbon sequestration and that new market, which we should be talking about that has really been put on the back shelf. Thanks to the Trump administration right now. So I'm, I'm very bearish, unfortunately. And that's kind of why I'm actually growing more corn this year, because I knew I at least have a market for it. Come back anytime, John, we'll talk about sequestration of carbon if you want to, but let me ask you quickly, got about a minute left and I don't know if viewers saw it, but the president was speaking in front of this gilded tractor yesterday at the White House, gold tractor. And he said he's going to go to John Deere and internationally to other companies and say, make less expensive farm equipment. Putting that aside, how do you think about making big capital investments like that at this moment? Is it something you can even weigh at this point in time because of all the uncertainty? His bail, quote, unquote bailout program, uh, gave farmers for soybeans, $30 an acre. John Deere's new X nine combine is officially the first implement that's over a million dollars. So when, according to the university of Illinois, last year, every farmer lost a hundred dollars an acre this year, according to the American farm bureau, every single commodity that we grow is unprofitable. And there's a reason why last year, all the farm equipment that was sold is half of his administration. John, before we let you go quickly, if there's one thing that this government could do for farmers across America, what would that be? Increase our demand. We have to increase the demand for our products. Um, and we need stability. And right now we're losing out to South America with the South American free trade agreement with Europe. Um, and, and Canada right now is joining with the South American free trade agreement. It's, it's absolutely crazy. We are in a world economy and we've been exporting food since the colonial days. And that's what we do in this country. We feed people and this administration needs to understand that.