GARRETSON, S.D. — Rodney Koch is enrolled in a Conservation Stewardship Program through the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, a five-year agreement to maintain existing conservation efforts and implement new ones in exchange for annual payments. With the government shutdown, Koch hasn’t been able to receive his funding.
“I did the practices, I did the things that we needed to do to fulfill last year’s program and now is when it should be funded,” Koch said. “Hopefully it still comes.”
Koch raises corn, soybeans, alfalfa, small grains and cover crops near Garretson, South Dakota, and is one of the many farmers feeling the effects of the government shutdown that began on Oct. 1.
The impact of the shutdown on agriculture and rural communities has been far reaching, American Farm Bureau Federation President Zippy Duvall wrote in a piece on Oct. 8.
"Farmers cannot take out loans, including mortgages and crop loans, which many will be counting on to help pay for supplies to grow next year’s crops. A federal shutdown also holds up critical disaster payments for farmers struggling to recover from drought, hurricanes, fires and floods that have all taken a toll on crops this year. Without these tools and assistance, many farmers will not be able to afford to grow a crop next year," he wrote.
His piece also noted crop reports and market data as things farmers are missing right now, and he mentioned that USDA employees — who often are low paid and working in understaffed offices — also are hurt by the shutdown. Local Farm Service Agency offices are closed, making those experts and services unavailable to the farmers that use them. Farmers can’t apply for any programs through the agency and funding has been momentarily suspended.
"It’s time for both sides of the aisle to come together, find a solution, and reopen the federal government. Farmers, rural communities, and families across the country are counting on our lawmakers to do their job," he wrote.
While everything for Koch’s Conservation Stewardship Program contract has been done and approved, the NRCS can’t distribute the funding or help him make plans for the next year since their employees are furloughed.
Koch said this causes challenges when it comes to making decisions for the upcoming year.
“You know, are we still going to be able to do this? It’s uncertain, a little nerve racking. Everything to plan for the '26 crop is happening now, and with the government being shut down and offices being closed, it makes it a challenge to know what to do and how are we going to navigate these murky waters we are in,” he said.
Many USDA reports, including the World Agriculture Supply and Demand Estimates and Crop Progress reports have been suspended during the government shutdown as well.
“We also don’t have grain reports, they are not coming out, so we don’t know where that and how that is affecting grain markets,” Koch said.
On top of not having access to funding, commodity markets are at a low state.
“Our commodities are pretty tough,” Koch said. “Our basis is about as wide as it’s been locally. There’s no place to go with soybeans, so it makes it tough. Do you store? Do you let go? You’ve got to find a market for them, you know, when 60% of our soybeans are exported and there’s no market, there’s no rail market, there’s no export, river, you know it’s not there. It’s affecting us locally.”
Koch said that with the state of the commodity markets at the moment, not receiving his NRCS funding puts a financial strain on the farming operation.
“Anything helps at this stage of the game, and where we are at with our current environment is very depressed. The returns are all in the red,” he said. “No matter how we go about it from a row crop standpoint, trying to raise corn and soybeans next year looks pretty dim.”
Koch isn't used to not being able to contact his local USDA offices.
“Lots of uncertainty. Where do we go from here? What’s going to happen? What’s going to be available? What’s not? We don’t know. So you can’t plan for it as we look to do renewals and try to figure out next year,” Koch said. “It gets to be a challenge when we can’t seek their advice either or look to try to do some of these other programs to help fill in the gaps. We’re at a standstill.”
Incentive funding and USDA agency offices, including FSA and NRCS, make a big impact on farming operations, especially when they are looking to implement conservation practices, Koch said.
“They definitely help us to navigate that and figure out ‘OK, my operation is completely different than the neighbors' and what are some things that we can do and some incentives to make those changes and to help implement them,’” Koch said. “I wouldn’t have been able to do everything that I did without them or have been on this journey to get to where we are and to make these changes that we’ve done.”
Koch hopes to see a resolution to the shutdown soon.
“It would be nice if we could try to figure this out, as a whole, as a society here together,” he said. “Seeing all that has happened, helping all these other countries and we can’t even help our own. Try to get along to act for the better of the people and what can we do as a society to work together to help each other out, so we can maintain our sustainable and safe food source that we have and what it takes to have that for future generations.”