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The most interesting takeaway for me was "don't let your costs of inputs be determined by specialized vendors when your revenue comes from a commodity". Or bac

The most interesting takeaway for me was "don't let your costs of inputs be determined by specialized vendors when your revenue comes from a commodity". Or backwards: "if you are in a commodity business, then you need to carefully control the costs of inputs, possibly by avoiding non-commodity capital equipment".

jelliclesfarm 6y ago
But corporate farms have swallowed family farms and there has been a massive consolidation. With every aspect of farming. Big tractor and the guy who sells you herbicide and suggests what seed to buy. You seed, inputs and yield projection is all done for you. And now with data collection..esp with tractors being outfitted with modern tech and AI, the farmer is like chopped meat...they are basically overseers with inherited land who collect subsidies, do the accounting, pay taxes and deliver to grain elevator. The system is designed to slowly chip away farms so the balance sheet becomes debt heavy and cash poor/land rich farmers end up selling anyways. The whole thing is rigged. The name of the game is consolidation. Across the border, I don’t know how it works w/Canadian commodity farms but at their dairy industry works with a diff subsidies model. It’s not like they have eliminated subsidies completely but it has helped not shutter dairy farms and is more protectionist. Perhaps relatedly..a slightly dated article: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/09/american-food-giants-swallow-the-family-farms-iowa https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/09/american...