A farm is feeling the squeeze of rising gas prices and tariffs
By Liam Clymer
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BURTON, Michigan (WJRT) — A local farm is shutting down parts of its production as rising diesel and part prices make it harder to turn a profit.
Kelly Walker was born on Walker Farm. That’s why it’s been so tough to say goodbye to parts of his production.
“The bottom line is you’re trying to make it profitable so you can be here next year, but you know, sometimes the fight gets to be too much,” Walker said.
As the war in Iran has caused the price of diesel fuel to skyrocket to a record $6.27 per gallon on average nationwide, he said he doesn’t really have a choice.
Much of modern farming equipment runs on diesel and high prices mean high costs going into each crop.
“You’re not going to work for a dollar an hour,” Walker said.
For Walker, that meant closing down his greenhouses and ceasing production of some products that the community came to expect for decades — flowers and vegetable plants — because they became harder to make a profit on.
He’s now bumped up the price of sweet corn, a fan favorite crop, 30 cents just to try and break even.
“Sweet corn is a high input. With diesel fuel and with fertilizer, it takes a lot more,” Walker said.
But even with reduced production and investment in more affordable, in-demand crops, called commodity crops, Walker said rising agricultural part prices from tariffs between the U.S. and Canada are salt in the wound.
“It just follows you, that same problem follows you. The diesel fuel, the price of chemicals, the parts, it all follows you,” Walker said.
Walker said he wants consumers to know he’s not trying to hurt their wallets, he’s just trying to stay in business.
Farm Business Management Educator with MSU Extension Jonathan LaPorte said that while farmers are the ones feeling the brunt of the production costs now, they’ll hit consumers soon enough and last for a while.
“If you’ve ever watched a little kid at the top of a a snow slope, going up, they’re like, ‘Oh, this is cool.’ But then they start going down and they’re like, ‘No, no, no, I don’t want to go down this fast,'” he said. “A lot of these costs, they’re quick to go up. They’re all excited when they’re going to go up high, but then when they’ve got to come down, they’re a little bit slow.”
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