Is America on the brink of a farm crisis?

Fourth-generation Iowa farmer Mark Mueller is no stranger to the ups and downs of the agriculture industry. But right now, he thinks America is on the brink of a farm crisis.

Subscribe to read this story without ads

Get ad-free articles and exclusive content.

“I’m more concerned now than I was 30 years into farming,” Mueller told NBC News.

Even before the Iran war, Mueller said, many farmers felt pressured. The consolidation of the fertilizer industry and increasing competition from other countries has led to higher prices for fertilizer and food – and less profit for Mueller’s corn and soybean crops.

Many farmers who could not pay their debts in recent years became weak. By 2025, the number of Chapter 12 farm bankruptcies will reach 315, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation. It was up 46% from last year.

Now, the war in Iran is putting even more pressure on farmers.

Before the war, about a third of the world’s fertilizers and a fifth of its oil supply passed each day through the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow strait off Iran’s southern coast. But since the US and Israel attacked Iran on Feb. 28, the strait was successfully closed by Tehran, leaving many tankers stranded.

The closure of the strait has raised global prices for fertilizer and the diesel fuel that powers much of America’s heavy agricultural equipment.

A double whammy hits farmers just as they enter the growing season.

“This is a perfect storm where everything comes together and hits the grower,” said Mueller, who also serves as president of the Iowa Corn Growers Association.

Mueller said his fertilizer supplier was selling the nitrogen fertilizer he needed for $795 a ton on Feb. 22, a few days before the war began. At the end of March, it was $990, Mueller said, a jump of nearly $200 in just a few weeks.

Meanwhile, the price he pays for diesel has gone up, too. Diesel now makes $5.51 a gallon nationally, up from $3.76 a gallon before the war, according to AAA.

Mueller says he got most of the fertilizer he needed in the year before the war – but he had to buy it at high prices. He is waiting to buy the additional fertilizer he needs in the summer, hoping that prices will drop.

President Donald Trump’s tariffs have also increased the cost of goods that farmers buy from overseas — and are discouraging many foreign buyers of American agricultural products.

“Our government made our lives more difficult by withdrawing from trade agreements or creating tariffs or angering our customers – our customers are nations and other companies in other nations,” said Mueller.y

Lance Lillibridge, a corn and cattle farmer from Vinton, Iowa, told NBC News that he plans to use less fertilizer this year.

“I’m probably going to see a decrease in yield,” Lillibridge said. “If the supply is not there, the price will go up.”

If the war continues, higher prices could trickle down the supply chain and eventually result in higher prices at the supermarket.

“We are talking about all the crops and all the food products that we eat every day,” said Gregory Daco, chief economist at EY-Parthenon.

“Everything that is grown, that needs fertilizers, which is most of everything that we eat, may be affected by this increase in fertilizer prices,” said Daco. “As a result, we may see these prices rise rapidly in grocery stores in the US”

For example, take corn. If corn prices rise, then feeding cattle becomes more expensive for many farmers. In addition, cattle farmers are also dealing with high fuel prices. Beef prices are already at record highs – partly due to dwindling cattle herds and drought – and could rise further.

Will Harris, a fourth-generation cattle rancher in Bluffton, Georgia, said: “I worry about how much consumers will continue to pay for beef. I think I can produce it as cheaply as anybody, but I don’t know where consumers draw their lines.

It may take time for the price to rise from the farm to the grocery store. Farmers are just planting their spring crops now, and it can take months for them to be harvested and delivered to food distribution centers and grocery stores.

But consumers may see higher prices sooner rather than later, due to higher transportation costs for premium diesel.

“If you’re feeling these costs now, they’re going to continue to increase as the supply becomes saturated with high-priced goods,” Lillibridge said.

“Corn is used in more than 4,000 products,” he added. “It’s not just food – it’s industrial products, like your paper that you put in your printer has cornstarch in it, plastics, just tons of industrial products from corn.”

Economists say that the longer the war continues, the greater the consequences.

“Right now, our farmers can get a product — it’s very expensive,” said Faith Parum, an economist at the American Farm Bureau Federation, an advocacy group for farmers and ranchers. “We’re starting to hear as time goes on, we’re going to have problems with the availability of fertilizer.”

That could cause more problems for farmers.

“We’re going through the fourth year of losses across the farm economy,” Parum said. It will be more difficult for them to put crops in the ground.

Before the war, the Department of Agriculture estimated that farm sector debt could reach a record $624.7 billion by 2026.

Farmers have received financial assistance from the federal government over the years. In December, the Trump administration announced $12 billion in new funding to help farmers.

At a White House event for farmers in March, Trump said he would push for more aid and urged Congress to pass a new farm bill.

Trump also pledged to ask Congress to allow year-round sales of E15, a lead-free fuel mixed with 15% ethanol that the American Farm Bureau Federation says could save consumers money at the gas pump and create markets for American-grown crops.

Mueller was one of the farmers last month at the White House, where he listened to Trump.

“I guess I can liken it to empty calories,” he said of the president. “It was like a low-key seniors’ meeting.”

Mueller fears that increasing pressures on farmers, exacerbated by the war, could cause some to hang up their hats indefinitely.

“I really see that the farmers are less when everything is finished,” he said. “Ultimately, the consumer will still have fewer choices, probably slightly higher prices, and farmers will have a lower margin than before.”