This Vox article discusses why 2019 was a brutal year for American farmers. Record flooding, a delayed harvest, and a trade war with China are hammering US agriculture this year.
US farmers have taken a particularly harsh beating this year from a one-two punch of nasty flooding exacerbated by climate change and a trade war with China.
Severe floods spurred by record rainfall soaked the southeast and the Midwest this summer, delaying plantings of corn and soy crops. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) reported that the 12-month period ending in May of this year was the wettest 12 months on record in the United States. (NOAA’s full climate and weather assessment for 2019 will be available in January.) Flooding on the Mississippi River this year also set records for how long it lasted in several locations.
In August, the US Department of Agriculture reported that farmers weren’t able to plant more than 19.4 million acres of cropland in 2019, the most since reporting began in 2007. Most of this area was spread across 12 states in the Midwest and Great Plains.