New data from the University of Minnesota and Minnesota State shows the median net farm income for Minnesota farms dropped to $21,964 in 2024, the lowest level this century.
Extension Economist Pauline Van Nurden with the University of Minnesota’s Center for Farm Financial Management joins us.
“So this past year in in Minnesota, we did see the lowest median net farm income for Minnesota producers since in the 21st century. That was especially true for crop producers who saw their incomes near zero for the median farm in 2024. That was down 95% from the previous year. So our livestock producers had a little bit better year, saw some improved profitability, but the crop producers certainly had a lot of challenges last year.”
Although Minnesota producers anticipated the challenges of 2024 due to weather, falling crop prices, rising input costs, and increasing interest rates made the situation worse.
“I mean 2024 was riddled with a lot of weather challenges and lower commodity prices. Unfortunately, the lower commodity prices seem to be here as well for the beginning of 2025, making marketing of old crop and pricing new crop more challenging and we’ll see, hopefully the spring weather cooperate a little bit better this year and at least we can get closer to a trend line yield for crop producers in general across the state.”
Van Nurden says as farmers plan for the 2025 growing season, to keep something in mind:
“I just always like to encourage producers to dig into their own personal farm finances, do their own benchmarking by knowing their cost of production and just taking a look at their financial position at this point and look at the options that are available to them, whether it’s trimming some expenses, having a marketing plan and sticking to it, and just making those adjustments as they go throughout the year.”
The data is collected by FINBIN, you can find that at finbin.umn.edu. It provides farm-level financial information, commodity-specific reports, and peer comparison benchmarks.
