Soaring crop prices poised to help out Midwest’s flood-stricken counties

FREMONT COUNTY, Neb. (WOWT) - Soaring crop prices are offering hope to some counties still coming back from 2019′s historic flood, as farmers poised to start injecting millions of dollars back into their local economies.

“There is a high demand in the world for the grain we’re producing and the world’s producing,” said Jeff Jorgenson, President, Iowa Soybean Association, and farmer in Fremont County. “The US didn’t produce as good a crop as we anticipated last year in 2020. It looked really good in July and August but a dry spell in August changed things.”

A tough blow to take as the county was still working to come back from the 2019 flood, which left thousands of acres of farmland underwater for more than a year. It cost the county an estimated $25 million in lost revenue.

“The reality is the cash flow the farmers get, a lot of it turns back into the economy in way, shape, or form,” said Jorgenson. “It can be from going out to eat more, which is very local, or it’s the purchases you make and those types of things so it all rolls.”

The county supervisor said he’s hopeful the high crop prices will go a long way in helping out farmers and the county.

“It allows them to maybe if they needed updated equipment that they were trying to do before maybe now maybe they can get that done, their frequenting more businesses.” “They’re able to inject more money into our economy through better prices,” said Chris Clark, Fremont County Supervisor.

The pandemic also playing a role in slowing down the county’s recovery.

“It’s definitely made it more difficult to come back from one disaster followed by another,” said Clark, noting, however, there are signs of progress.

“I think we’ve already showed that our ability, our ingenuity, our work ethic, is proving to grow us into the future and I think there’s a lot of good things on the horizon for us.”

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