12-20 FB Barley Concerns

 Idaho may not be the leading producer of barley in the nation but it is up there.  I’ve had a number of conversations with Kelly Olson who is the administrator for the Idaho Barley  commission and while Kelly says things are good is certainly some apprehension. “Idaho had a strong showing in barley production and I think our growers are pretty bullish on barley.  I think there’s concern for the potential for high production costs. Fertilizer is predicted to be priced significantly higher just because corn is trading at a very high price. Historically high prices and corn is the leading user of nitrogen globally and certainly in the US and so when corn prices are high the fertilizer dealers set their price to what  the corn market will bear and so our growers pay the penalty for high corn costs. I think that people are nervous about this winter with very short irrigation storage and a lot of uncertainty about what next 9 months and what the weather will bring in the next 6 months which is the snow accumulation period. I think people are very nervous about that we are technically in a neutral position weather wise. It is not El Niño, it is not La Niña so we are not sure what that means.”