Potato State Football Trophy and Financial Conditions in Farm Country
From the Ag Information Network, this is your Agribusiness Update.
**The University of Idaho and Idaho State University have introduced the new Potato State Trophy, a traveling trophy awarded to the winner of the annual football game between the two schools.
www.potatogrower.com reports, the Potato State Trophy officially replaces the retired Battle of the Domes Trophy which was discontinued.
A University of Idaho athletics staff member carved the new trophy, a large wooden potato, out of a piece of North Idaho Douglas Fir.
**The American Bankers Association offered its views to the House Ag Committee on the financial conditions in farm country.
Through 2023, more than 3,800 U.S. banks had agricultural loans on their books with $198.6 billion outstanding.
Tony Hotchkiss, chair of the Ag and Rural Bankers Committee, says many producers have worked through the liquidity and working capital they built up in recent years due to rising input prices and lower commodity prices.
He says we may be looking over an agricultural economy cliff without government policy changes.
**The USDA estimates 2023 farm production expenditures in the U.S. at $481.9 billion, up from $452.5 billion the previous year.
The four largest expenditures totaled $238.7 billion and accounted for nearly 50% of total expenditures in 2023.
These include feed at 16.6%, livestock, poultry, and related expenses at 11.6%, farm services at 11.3%, and labor at 10.1%.
