Midwest Agriculture Conference Welcome Remarks Transcript

ELIZABETH KEPNER: Thank you for being here with us this morning. My name is Elizabeth Kepner, and I'm a business economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. I'm excited to have you all with us, both here in Chicago and online today for our 21st Annual Midwest Agriculture Conference.

I'm going to set the stage a little bit and tell you about the seventh Federal Reserve district, which is the district that the Chicago Fed serves. And then I'll talk a little bit about why our conference topic today, Midwest Agriculture and Trade Uncertainty, is particularly timely and relevant for our district.

So the seventh Federal Reserve district encomp

asses all of Iowa, the entire state of Iowa, and parts of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, and Wisconsin. You'll frequently hear our President and CEO, Austan Goolsbee, refer to this district as the heart of the Midwest. And our district states contribute quite strongly to national agricultural output.

So all together, these states contributed 46% of national corn output, 42% of national soybean output, and 47% of national hog output last year in 2024. This is compared to the states' contribution to national GDP for all industries of about 10.5%. So we contribute a lot more to agricultural output as a whole.

Several of our states rank highly in exports for agricultural products. So Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana are all in the top five state exporters of corn, soybeans, and pork. And Wisconsin and Michigan are number two and number six exporters of dairy products, respectively.

Overall, Iowa exports the second largest amount of agricultural products, Illinois third, and Indiana seventh. Needless to say, this question of agricultural trade is top of mind for many in our district.

While we won't know what actual crop production for this fall's harvest is for a while longer, forecasts are for record high corn and soybean yields per acre. Additionally, US and our district state's corn production are anticipated to be the highest ever. Though prices are lower than in recent years, 2025 estimates for national corn and soybean revenues are slightly above those of last year, though significantly lower than 2021 through 2023.

For our district states, revenues are anticipated to be slightly lower than the previous year. And in contrast to these higher yield forecasts for crop producers, livestock producers see a mixed outlook. Beef production forecasts are slightly down and prices are up. Export projections for beef were lowered as a result of that decline in production and high prices. Pork production declined slightly, but exports were expected to be flat in 2025, despite increases in exports to Mexico and some countries in Central America.

Amidst these record high yields and high levels of production, agriculture faces uncertainty in the realm of global trade. This goes for exports, which I'll talk a little bit about later, but also some inputs. While US producers are less reliant on imports of fertilizers like nitrogen and phosphorus, potassium is imported largely from Canada and Europe. Changes in tariff plans and rates leave these price expectations in flux.

According to the USDA's most recent agricultural trade outlook report, the US imported about $32 billion more in agricultural goods than it exported in fiscal 2024, with $206 billion of imports, compared to $174 billion in exports. This bucks the historical trend of a US agricultural trade surplus. Furthermore, the August outlook for the 2025 fiscal year estimates an agricultural trade deficit of $47 billion, down slightly from the May estimate.

China has been one of the largest importers of US soybeans. During the October to June period of 2024, China imported $23 billion of US agricultural goods. During that same period in 2025, that number was just $15 billion. In fiscal year 2024, China accounted for 14.8% of all US agricultural exports, while in 2026, that number is projected to be 9%.

These shifting dynamics in agricultural trade have large impacts on local producers, including for their planting decisions, their revenues, and their profitability. Today's conference will explore this issue of agricultural trade. The morning sessions are titled Agriculture and Trade Policy Shifts and The Geography of Agricultural Trade, Partners and Competitors. Speakers include experts from research universities in and around our district.

Over lunch, our President and CEO, Austan Goolsbee, will participate in a fireside chat moderated by Edward Lawrence of the Fox Business Network. And in the afternoon, we'll hear from a panel of economists, owners, and financial experts on the implications of the current trade environment for Midwest agriculture. I'm really looking forward to these interesting conversations on the timely topic of agricultural trade.

I'm going to take a quick second to do an administrative thing. This is our QR code for Pigeonhole. This is how we're going to moderate questions today. So you can scan this QR code with your phone, submit questions to Pigeonhole, and you can also upvote other people's questions if you'd like to upvote those questions. And those questions will be moderated by David. There will be a QR code I think on almost every slide in this presentation, so you should be able to access it throughout.

I'm going to take a second to introduce our first speakers, Amanda Countryman and Shawn Arita. Amanda is an associate professor in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at Colorado State University. Her research examines the economic implications of international trade, focusing specifically on the impacts of trade reforms on agriculture. Prior to joining the faculty at CSU, she was an agricultural economist at the USDA Economic Research Service.

Shawn is the Associate Director of the Agricultural Risk Policy Center at North Dakota State University. Before joining the center, Sean was a senior economist at the USDA's office of the chief economist. He's widely recognized for expertise in agricultural policy, agricultural commodity markets, economic modeling, and impact assessment. Amanda will present first and take questions right after that, and then Sean will join us. Amanda.

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