Search - The Packer

Rural infrastructure costs farmers time, fuel and safety.

Missouri farmers use the Canton Ferry to transport grain across the Mississippi River to an elevator in Meyer, Ill.

Facing our challenges to guarantee our competitive edge

A recent study shows that farmers, more than any other segment of agriculture, are responsible for paying the transportation costs from the farm to the dinner plate.

Co-op investment tightens basis, but venture is not risk-free.

Truck rates are running well below a year ago and most U.S. fresh produce shipping districts had adequate to surplus truck availability in late May.

Truck rates moved strongly higher in south Texas and Arizona in early June, the U.S. Department of Agriculture reports.

A scale-tipping harvest, a lack of bin space from last year and a shortage of rail cars have some farmers, and some elevators, pouring wheat on the ground because there’s no place to put it.

The ripening corn and soybean fields stretch for miles in every direction from Dennis Wentworth’s farm in Downs, Illinois.

The delays have stretched dangerously close to grain harvesting season, when barges need to carry wheat, soybeans and corn from throughout the Midwest down to the Gulf Coast for export.