Below is an opinion piece by OKFB President Stacy Simunek that was published on Sept. 24 in The Oklahoman.
Tractors, combines and trucks are currently rolling across Oklahoma fields for the fall harvest and fieldwork season. It is a time of year that is usually filled with hope and excitement for what is to come, but in 2026, our family farmers and ranchers are facing unprecedented times of high input costs, depressed commodity prices and the ever-unpredictable Oklahoma weather.
Oklahoma families know first-hand what gasoline prices have done to their monthly budgets, and our farmers and ranchers are dealing with an even bigger strain on their operating costs. When diesel prices skyrocketed in recent months, it turned a bad situation into a crisis on the farm.
On my family farm near Blackwell in northern Oklahoma, multiple tractors are working in the fields, sprayers are running to control weeds, and multiple vehicles are moving people, seed and supplies.
The off-road diesel in our area, which we use to fuel our farm equipment, reached $5.66 per gallon recently. When our family is working in the field with multiple pieces of equipment, we use anywhere between 750 and 800 gallons of diesel per day. That means our daily fuel bill is more than $4,000 just to keep our equipment running.
Prices for the fertilizer we apply to our fields to make sure our land is productive have also skyrocketed. Fertilizer that normally would cost $350 per ton is currently $850 per ton. To get through fall wheat planting, my farm usually uses between 125-150 tons of liquid fertilizer, meaning that my fertilizer bill alone for my wheat crop is nearly $75,000 more expensive than what I’m used to paying.
As a result, I am seeding only 250 acres of wheat in 2026 instead of the 1,600 acres I planted a year ago.
As if these rising input costs were not enough to deal with, the prices we receive for our farm products continue to trail behind the cost required to actually raise a crop. Add in the unpredictable Oklahoma weather with moderate or worse drought covering our entire state, and it has been a hard year for Oklahoma agriculture.
Oklahoma agriculture is currently in uncharted territory. Yes, we have seen input prices rise in the past, we have gone through times of depressed commodity prices and we are used to challenging weather. But when all those factors all hit at the same time this summer, we experienced not a flash drought but a flash farm crisis.
What happens across the world eventually makes an impact on Oklahoma farms and ranches. This year’s geopolitical struggles have pinched all Americans, but agriculture has especially suffered through the negative consequences. We need resolutions to global conflicts and fair trade deals with our trading partners that helps them purchase the American agricultural products they need.
We also need Congress to pass a new farm bill. With the economic pressures farmers face, a farm bill can only do so much, but the stability that sound farm policy can provide might be the only firm ground we can find. I just hope it is not too late for some Oklahoma farmers and ranchers who are considering whether they can afford to continue farming or ranching.
But the growing season does not wait for anyone, and we cannot simply wait to plant a crop until diesel and fertilizer prices go down. That is why Oklahoma farmers, including my own family, are still planting seeds today that will produce the crop that feeds our country next year. As we fuel up the tractor and fill the grain drill, we pray that by the time this crop breaks through soil into the daylight, farmers and ranchers will be seeing their own daylight of economic relief.
Read the original article on The Oklahoman’s website here.
