Business: The Farmers' Bursting Cornucopia

IT should be the best crop I've had in many, many years," gloated Delmar Grotefendt, surveying the fields of ripe golden corn on his 350-acre farm in Marine, Ill. Only last year corn blight, which destroyed 15% of the nation's corn harvest, rotted black much of Grotefendt's planting. Farmers feared that the virulent fungus might ruin up to half the crop this summer. Yet last week, a mood of quiet satisfaction was evident across the U.S. heartland as farmers began bringing in one of the most bountiful harvests in history.

Almost every crop will be larger than last year. The Agriculture Department expects a record 1.6 billion bushel harvest of wheat, or 18% more than in 1970. An unmatched 1.2 billion bushels of soybeans is predicted. Since the threat of widespread blight never materialized, the corn yield is expected to weigh in at an unprecedented 5.3 billion bushels, up 28% from last year.

Perfect Weather. A big factor in checking the blight was the unusually dry weather in July and August that deprived the fungus of life-giving moisture. The cornbelt states of Illinois, Nebraska and Iowa, which were badly plagued in 1970, escaped with only light damage this summer. "The weather was perfect," says Wyne Englehardt, who grows corn and wheat on a 4,000-acre farm near Oakley, Kans. Many farmers in Southern states where leaf disease broke out in 1970 planted blight-resistant seeds this year. Thus the spores could not accumulate and be blown North to infect fields there.

A change in the Government's complicated price-support program also contributed to the overflowing corn crop. To offset the possible effects of blight this year, the program was realigned to induce farmers to use up to 20% more of their corn-growing land instead of leaving it fallow. The result: corn plantings increased by almost 7,000,000 acres, to 64 million acres.

This bursting cornucopia is not likely to result in quick or major cuts in food prices. Feed for hogs and cattle will be cheaper as a result of the bumper corn crop. But farmers reduced their hog production last year because of low prices and high feed costs caused by the blight. The effect of their decision will be felt in stores early next year and will probably make bacon, sausage and other pork products slightly costlier than now. More cattle will be raised this year, but this beefed-up production will not be reflected in meat-counter prices for 18 months—if ever. Says Economist Larry Simerl of the University of Illinois: "Consumers buy more beef every year, and this increased demand is likely to absorb any increase in production." The best that shoppers can probably expect is more cut-rate supermarket specials on chickens.

Less Clout. For many of the 3,000,000 U.S. farmers, the pleasure derived from the bumper crop is tempered by a wistful remembrance of things past. Its numbers much diminished by increasing mechanization on ever larger tracts, the farm bloc has lost much of its political clout in Washington and the nation. A chronic dissatisfaction afflicts small farmers, many of whom are forced off the land each year. Those who remain face persistent rises in production costs; last year, despite a record gross income of $56.6 billion, farmers wound up with total earnings of $15.7 billion—$500 million less than the year before.