SEGMENT: IRRIGATION, FARM BUSINESS, & COMMODITIES
Stephen Scates>ISM Interviews M-Z>ISM Interviews M-Z, Segment 9
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- FLOODS
- Hope it doesn't happen, but there's nothing you can do when it does. Recalls in 1968 or '69 the flood war came up and destroyed their crop. Notes that crop insurance is nice to help offset the cost of disasters.
- DRAINAGE
- Discusses what they do to drain the land.
- IRRIGATION
- On White County farm, soil is light with hard ground underneath. Crops would look good, but draughts would reduce them to 60 or 70 bushels. Center-pivot irrigation system in 1975. Valley Irrigation dealers. Service their own system, has a business that services the IN/KY/Illinois area. Droughts have been the most disastrous. Flooding hasn't hurt their yield too much.
- FARM BUSINESS
- Crop insurance helps offset cost. Banks like to know their interests have protection. Bunge in Shawneetown, and Cargill and Consolidated in Mt. Vernon, IN load their crops into grain elevators. From there they load the grain onto barges that take them to New Orleans, LA. Move part of the crop after harvest, the rest of it between December and March. A certain amount is forward contracted, priced ahead of time.
- COMMODITY PRICES
- LIVESTOCK
- Hasn't had pigs since the 1980s.