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Farm and Food File
418 South Second St. Mankato, MN 56001 (800) 657-4665 Vol. XL ❖ No. 10 24 pages, 1 section plus supplements
Cover photo by Renae B. Vander Schaaf
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How far did you roam? I ended up 88 clearly remember when cordless phones miles from where I grew up. College took were introduced and how my brother and me to the faraway locale known as Fargo, I wanted my parents to get one so we N.D., then on to Grand Forks and could take the phone anywhere in the Hillsboro. But in 2004 we moved back to house and not have to worry about how the Land of 10,000 Lakes and have been far that cord stretched. here ever since. Around that same time, my mom took a
In 2008, Pew Research reported that in girls trip to New York City. She did some the Midwest, nearly half of adults say they have spent their entire lives in their LAND MINDS shopping on Canal Street which was infamous for knock-off purses and other hometown. In comparison, fewer than By Kristin Kveno “great deals.” While perusing the items one-third of people in Western states she and my aunts found cordless OPINION phones for an amazing bargain. They each bought one — still in the boxes. I remember my mom proudly showing us the box when she got back from the trip. still live in their hometown. We are creatures of habit and comfort. It’s no surprise half of us live where we grew up. With a large number of people now able to work from home due to the pandemic, how we work and Initially, joy ensued when she opened it, but the where we work is changing. Those who yearned to smile quickly faded from her face. The “new” phone come back home to rural America, but were faced had other people’s numbers written on the back of with the dilemma of having a job in a big city, now it, some hair attached to the receiver and was suddenly don’t have to choose. Working from home dreadfully dirty. My mom suddenly realized that the has allowed people to now live where they want — phone may have had a questionable past. We never regardless of where their job is located. used that phone. My parents decided getting one at People are on the move. With low interest rates, houses go on the market and sell in no time. According to Redfin, home prices in Minnesota were Target was a better, cleaner option. That crazy phone started our family’s foray into the world of cordless communication. up 9.5 percent year-over-year in March. The number Kids these days will never know what it’s like to of homes sold rose 5.7 percent while the number of trip on a phone cord; or have your mom bring home homes for sale fell 51.4 percent. It is definitely a a cordless phone which may have unknowingly been seller’s market out there. It will be interesting to stolen goods. Times have changed and as the saying see whether housing demands in rural Minnesota goes, the only constant is change. continue to pick up as the job landscape evolves. Those memories of home though, they are yours
Stories from our homes where we grew up are forever. Whether you still live right where you grew some of my kids’ favorites to hear. When my hus- up or thousands of miles away, there really is no band and I share tales from our youth with our chil- place like home. dren, they marvel at the “archaic” ways we used to Kristin Kveno is the staff writer of The Land. She live. Like how we each grew up with kitchen phones may be reached at kkveno@TheLandOnline.com. ❖ sporting incredibly, ridiculously-long cords which stretched to just about every one of the rooms. I
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Reports are trickling in concerning the return of county fairs in 2021. Is your county planning a fair this summer? Drop us a line at editor@thelandonline.com or call us at (507) 345-4523 and let us know. We want to help spread the word!
INSIDE THIS ISSUE
7 — Patience is key when training dogs to herd sheep 8 — Young family is finding success with sheep and lambs
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• “Nuts and Bolts” — News and new products from the ag industry • “E-Edition” — Archives of past issues of The Land
China is even hungrier, richer, and — to China’s consumption of soybeans surged the delight of almost every American from 20 million metric tons to 114 milfarmer — more impatient in today’s glob- lion in 2020-21…” al food market than anyone thought possible even a decade ago. That’s an “average annualized 7.6 percent” growth rate. As a result, China
In fact, according to the data crunchers quickly grew to become the big dog in the at Agricultural Economic Insights (aei), global bean business. Now, it buys “more China now imports “about 100 million than 60 percent of globally imported soyacres worth of crop production, or roughly FARM & FOOD FILE beans.” 25 percent of total crop consumption.” Think about that — one in four By Alan Guebert The growth picture for Chinese corn imports is similar. From the 1970s bushels of any grain like soybeans, rice, corn, wheat and sorghum used in OPINION onward, “Production and consumption have been essentially in lock-stop … China today is not grown in In the last three years, however, China today. Part of the reason is that the nation’s domestic consumption has outpaced production … farming acreage, explains aei, “has remained mostly [and] for the 2020-21 marketing year, China purstable since 1990.” chased 13 percent of the globally traded corn…”
Another key reason, of course, is that the country’s In fact, China’s grocery list is so long, say the aei population has been anything but stable. In 1990, analysts, it now purchases “85 percent of global China was a nation of 1.13 billion; today it’s home trade” in sorghum, “more than 60 percent of the to 1.41 billion people, or 18 percent of the world’s global trade in dry milk powder,” and “nearly 30 population. percent of global beef trade.” (A decade ago, it
Put another way, since 1990, China has added as “essentially imported zero beef.”) many people as now live in Indonesia, 280 million, And that’s not all. the world’s fourth most populous nation. China now composes “10 percent of the global
This wild, continuous growth, however, is over. chicken trade,” and, with the onset of its devastatAccording to the May 10 New York Times, only 12 ing African swine fever outbreak in 2019, China million children were born in China last year, the moved from buying “roughly 20 percent of global lowest birth total since famine-ravaged 1961. The [pork] trade… to nearly 50 percent for 2020-21.” slowing birth rate indicates China “faces a demographic crisis that could stunt growth in the world’s second-largest economy.” With a cash buyer like that roaming global grocery markets, little wonder any food production glitch — like a run of dry weather in South America
This change, however, can’t change China’s demo- or a crop-flattening wind in Iowa — sends many graphic challenge in the coming decade: it still has commodity markets to once-in-a-decade highs. too many people to feed from too little land. But can China’s big (and perhaps overly big) mar-
In the past, notes aei in a May 10 post, that mat- ket influence last? tered less. For example, from the 1970s through the 1990s, “China’s production and consumption of soyBig, probably … overly big, probably not. beans was nearly lock-step.” “…China likely holds strong growth in consumpOf course, balancing the books back then often came with the wave of an autocrat’s hand, not the market’s free hand. tion and more reliance on imports,” aei analysts forecast. “But trends will also be impacted by consumer preferences and habits, policies, trade disruption, and global events…” Soon thereafter, though, a growing, more tradedependent economy took root and “(a)round 2000… “In short,” aei concludes, “it will become harder to point to China and make a blanket statement about strong demand for agricultural commodities.”
That’s a prudent reading of today’s ag export markets. There are reasons — like China’s binge buying and today’s weather-tightened supplies — why commodity prices soar. Once those reasons flatten or disappear, so too do the once-in-a-decade markets.
Or, as a now near-90 year old farmer once told me: “I’ve been through four or five ‘new market plateaus’ in my life and not one ever became an ‘old’ market plateau.”
The Farm and Food File is published weekly through the United States and Canada. Past columns, events and contact information are posted at www.farmandfoodfile.com. v
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Letter: Use patience on the road
To the Editor, It’s that time of the year again as the tractors and equipment take to the OPINION that we do this work because we want to, not because we have to. There is a difference! road. As impatient drivers drive past giving the Larry Otto one-finger salute, I would like to remind them. As Lester Prairie, Minn. you pull yourself up to the dinner table, remember
