KSHB 41 anchor/reporter JuYeon Kim covers agricultural issues and the fentanyl crisis. Share your story idea with JuYeon.
The United States and China confirmed a reduction in high tariffs they previously imposed on each other, but the agricultural community is still concerned about the immediate and long-term impacts.
According to the American Farm Bureau Federation, 20% of farm income comes from exports.
Heading into 2025, many farmers were just hoping to break even. The last several years have been a struggle, with the pandemic, inflation, fickle weather and high input costs.
“They’re quick to go up, but sticky coming down,” said Andrew Beeman, owner and manager of Beeman Farms.
International tariffs are especially hurting soybean farmers like Beeman. At least half of all soybean production in the U.S. is exported and the biggest buyer is China.
China also bought nearly $25 billion worth of U.S. corn, beef, chicken and other crops last year.
“You can’t really count on them, although they have a huge population and if we can get into that market, it’s really good,” said Beeman.
Beeman is closely watching trade negotiations, but risk is not something he is willing to take more of. He has been proactively changing his operations to protect to his businesses since the November election.
“Whenever it became apparent in the latter part of last year that the Trump Administration was going to take office, I elected to sell most of my soybeans right out of the field,” said Beeman.
He is also planting more corn this year, instead of soybeans, because it is less reliant on international markets.
“Hope it would be resolved by the time we have crop to sell,” said Beeman.
Many experts are concerned, long-term, the country will see losses in market share as well.
“It’s like well, if we don’t have alternative markets for those corn, soy beans, wheat — all the stuff that we grow,” said Managing Director of Armada Corporate Intelligence, Chris Kuehl.
For example, much of that loss is usually taken up by agricultural export powerhouses like Brazil.
“It will probably be a while before anybody can look back and say, 'yeah, the ultimate winner on this was country X,”' said Kuehl.
Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins did not rule out the possibility of government aid. President Trump allocated tens of billions during his last trade war back in 2019 and 2020.
But it is help Beeman does not want to take.
“No farmers like handouts from the government," Beeman said. "We’d much rather just make money on our own. If we wanted to play it safe, we’d get an office job.”
