Valuetainment - Why 70% of Farmers Can't Afford to Grow Food Anymore

00:00:00.000 They did a study to find out what percentage of kids under the age of 10 know where milk comes

00:00:03.640 from. Did you know a third did not know that milk comes from cows? They thought it's just at the

00:00:08.960 store. Do you know why? Because we have no clue what farmers do on a daily basis. You and I don't.

00:00:13.800 We don't even think about farmers. All we think about is, why is this food so expensive? Farmers

00:00:18.120 have become greedy. Well, we don't realize that the Strait of Hormuz challenge that's taking place

00:00:22.560 right now. 33% of global fertilizer seaborn trade passes through the Strait of Hormuz.

00:00:28.520 Just in 2025, you know what percentage of farmers filed bankruptcy last year?

00:00:33.400 Up 46%.

00:00:36.280 These people could go one, two, three, five years making nothing.

00:00:41.080 And today, it's the worst it's been for them in a long time.

00:00:44.900 And when we think about farmers, I think about the feeders, they feed you and I,

00:00:49.480 the builders and the risk takers,

00:00:51.680 and only 9% of Americans that are in farming are under the age of 35, which means what?

00:00:56.640 Young kids are not grown up saying I want to be a farmer

00:00:59.260 They're saying I want to grow up to be a YouTuber

00:01:01.060 We need more people wanting to be farmers

00:01:03.460 We're going to talk about the challenges

00:01:04.860 Farmers are facing today

00:01:06.820 And how the war with Iran

00:01:08.580 Is impacting their bottom lines today

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00:01:26.600 Having said that, let's get right into it. So prices of fertilizer in just the last few months

00:01:31.560 went from $350 per ton to $600. And these farmers are being hit by it. Now, when we think about

00:01:38.420 farmers, the shipping crisis is making your grocery prices higher, not because farmers are

00:01:44.760 trying to explode you and I, it's because they're going through a challenging time right now. By the

00:01:49.340 way, the average farmer, people don't know what their margins are. In a good year, farmers make

00:01:54.440 three to 10% net profits. Average year, zero to five. Many years, they'll make nothing. Literally,

00:02:01.560 they will make nothing many years while they're building their business. So as they're going

00:02:05.340 through this, this is the challenge. I got four things going on. Number one, farmer's problems

00:02:09.740 equals consumer's problems. So if you're wanting to fix your problem, we got to help the farmers out.

00:02:14.980 Inorganic input. So fertilizer and chemical costs. That's one of the things we're talking about.

00:02:18.660 Number two, energy costs, production and transport. That fertilizer that's coming here, that a third

00:02:23.720 of the world's fertilizers is being done right now by China. I think 25 to 30%. You got India's

00:02:27.900 on that list. You got Russia's on that list. You got, I think Belarus is on that list. Couple of

00:02:32.320 these countries are on that list that we're going through. So you got production and transport. Well,

00:02:36.600 if the Strait of Hormuz got a blockade, guess what's not coming to anybody? The fertilizer that

00:02:41.100 you need. Number three is a geopolitical issue. Shipping wars, tariff, all of that stuff. We're

00:02:45.760 definitely dealing with this. And a labor pool, migrant workforce, native population. Some of 0.98

00:02:50.800 these folks that are sitting there saying, hey, I lost my workers that are willing to work on farms.

00:02:55.160 I don't have anybody. It's kind of impacting me. We got to kind of take advantage of some of the

00:02:59.260 people that are here. We need their help. Hey, let's bring them back. That's a whole different

00:03:03.120 immigration issue that's impacting our farmers. Next, profit margins where they're at. Farmers 0.97

00:03:09.380 do not benefit from higher costs. They're trapped in the inflation cycle themselves too. So meaning

00:03:14.100 retail prices increase, are absorbed by middle market costs, packaging, processor financing,

00:03:19.060 high interest rates labor anticipate a three percent increase in production costs for 2026

00:03:24.140 farm profit margins are likely going through negative this year meaning farmers are probably

00:03:30.180 making nothing in 2026 so if you look at this the farm input squeeze 2020 to 2026 fertilizer costs

00:03:38.320 up 63 machinery up 38 fuels up 38 repairs and supplies 27 chemicals 22 they are

00:03:48.720 having issues financially themselves producing the product that you and i need by the way when

00:03:53.860 you think about different industries farmers are right on what kind of money they make

00:03:57.200 row crops they make two to eight percent this is corn if you go to dairy farms zero to five percent

00:04:02.920 they don't make a lot of margin livestock beef and poultry five to twelve percent and the ones

00:04:07.640 that make good money is the niche markets like we got a couple farms here that we go and buy the

00:04:12.320 eggs from there. It's organic. It's ramped typically by a family. They make 10 to 25%,

00:04:18.220 if not higher. This is why they rely, farmers heavily rely annually on the federal government

00:04:24.980 to give them money or else they're not going to be able to survive. You know what we paid them

00:04:28.400 this year? 44. In 2026, I believe the budget is $44.3 billion. You know what that number was just

00:04:34.800 10 years ago in 2016? 2016 was $12 billion. We went from 2016, 12 billion to 2026, 44.3 billion.

00:04:42.320 because if we don't pay them, they don't make money. They leave the industry and they go to a

00:04:48.140 complete different business. And by the way, in Florida right now where we live, since 2005,

00:04:53.000 do you know 90% of the orange groves that we have in Florida? You know, you hear about like the

00:04:57.820 orange bowl. Everything in Florida is about orange. Since 2005 till today, 90% of all the orange

00:05:05.120 groves have been destroyed because there was a blithe that they claimed came from Asia. Some are

00:05:11.620 allegedly saying this came from China, they dropped it to hurt the Florida market. Students come up

00:05:16.480 here, they hurt the farmers, 90% in Florida, and the business is still solid, but 90% was impacted

00:05:23.940 by. So the risk that they have, weather, conditions, all of these different things, they still get up

00:05:29.420 every day. Just like Paul Harvey said many years ago, when he told the story of God loves farmers,

00:05:34.880 there's a reason for it. Let me continue as we're going through this year. Imagine being a farmer

00:05:38.680 the last six years. You dealt with COVID, all the regulations, travel, everything's shut down. Oh,

00:05:43.360 give me a break. All I'm trying to do is make money. That hurt them. Ukraine, 2022, 2024. Why? 0.81

00:05:49.760 Again, fertilizers, 18%. And now you got the war that's taking place here. That's impacting them

00:05:55.180 as well. So shipping disruptions do not stay in the Gulf. Inputs leads to planting decisions,

00:05:59.820 leads to crop yields, leads to grocery shelf prices. And then what happens? Post-Epic Fury,

00:06:05.320 US urea import costs jumped 30% in a single week. By the way, last but not least, this chart I'm

00:06:12.360 going to show you before we wrap it up. 70% of American farmers today cannot afford all needed

00:06:18.020 fertilizer. 70% of all farmers cannot afford the amount of fertilizer they need today. If you want

00:06:26.240 to get even more specific of by what product, rice, 88% of them can't afford it. When it comes

00:06:32.420 on to cotton 86 peanuts 84 sorghum 80 oats 73 wheat 70 soybean corn fruit barley vegetables 61

00:06:42.900 they cannot afford a fertilizer and if you're wondering market-wise what area it is 78 is what

00:06:49.080 region us where we are okay southern region 69 is north eastern region 48 is midwest and then you

00:06:56.380 have 66 percent that is the western region this issue you may be watching is saying uh why should

00:07:03.060 i care about this well if you care about the food that you're eating if you care about if you're not

00:07:08.580 going to do the farming because i'm not going to do it myself it's not something i choose to do i

00:07:12.320 chose a complete different profession you i you also didn't choose to do it just like somebody

00:07:16.940 chose to serve the military and go to you know wherever they are in the world right now 18 months

00:07:21.800 away from their own families. It's not a job you and I decided to do. We want people to choose to

00:07:27.200 serve the military the same way we want people to choose to wake up every single morning wanting to

00:07:31.800 be farmers. And the most important thing they need is what? An incentive and pride that we, you and I

00:07:38.580 are grateful for them and we understand the challenges they are facing today. So whenever

00:07:43.560 you hear conversations about farmers, wherever you go where you run into farmers, we had an event a

00:07:49.260 couple of weeks ago at the Trump Doral. And it was a man, I was telling the story of Paul Harvey

00:07:53.540 about God loving farmers. He comes to me afterwards on my house. He's got his old hat on. He's a

00:07:58.520 farmer. We sent a bunch of our guys to his place, a guy named Saul Mario and a couple other guys

00:08:02.380 went to the farm. A couple of different people are there spending time with them. The stories,

00:08:07.140 the pride it takes to do what they do. If you run into a farmer at an airport or anywhere else,

00:08:12.820 and they say they're farmers, oh, you know, they're farmers. Take a quick second and say,

00:08:16.720 thank you for your service, because without them, you and I and America would be in a lot of trouble

00:08:22.400 today. If you got value out of this video, give it a thumbs up, and to the 51% of the community that

00:08:27.020 watches our content but hasn't subscribed, click on that button. It means a lot to us, helps us

00:08:31.320 up with the algorithms, and if you enjoyed this video, you want to watch another video I did three

00:08:35.340 years ago on farmers protesting around the world. Click here to watch it, and then last but not

00:08:40.900 least, if you want to get the notes of everything we discussed for free, click on the QR code

00:08:44.680 somewhere around here. Go to the PBD Entrepreneur Circle. You can download the notes and then go

00:08:48.620 share it with your friends, family, and talk about it as well. Take care, everybody. Bye-bye, bye-bye.

Valuetainment - May 11, 2026

Why 70% of Farmers Can't Afford to Grow Food Anymore

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