No one should be surprised by the latest reportsshowing Iowa farm income has fallen sharply. Commodity prices are abysmal, input costs remain high, and farm families continue to do what they’ve always done: Work harder, spend less, and hope next year brings better conditions.
America’s farmers have never wanted to depend on government assistance. What they have always wanted is the opportunity to compete, innovate and sell more of what they produce. Throughout our history, agriculture has prospered when we’ve opened new markets, not when we’ve expanded government programs.
And the opportunity is here. Sustainable aviation fuel, low-carbon marine fuels, and other next-generation biofuels have the potential to create billions of gallons of new demand for American ethanol. Airlines are already signing long-term fuel agreements, and countries around the world are adopting low-carbon fuel standards. The global shipping industry is looking for alternatives to traditional fuels. These markets are real; they are growing, and Iowa farmers should be leading the way in supplying them.
What’s worse, is Iowa farmers could be realizing these benefits today.
Think about where we’d be today if the Summit carbon pipeline had stayed on its original schedule. Iowa ethanol producers could already be supplying planes, ships, and cars with clean, renewable biofuels, and farmers would be seeing the benefits of stronger demand instead of another year of tight or negative margins.
Four years of delay, delay, and more delay while farmers lose market opportunities that are increasingly being filled by foreign competitors. It’s been said many times: “If you snooze, you lose.” In this case, it’s a travesty for Iowa farmers and our rural economy.
Let America’s farmers do what they do best: Produce the safest, most abundant food, feed, and fiber. Government’s role, and regulators’ role, should be to allow them to compete for new markets, not hamstring them and then send them a check to make up for the markets they lose.
This debate has never really been about one pipeline. It’s about whether Iowa intends to lead the next chapter of American agriculture or watch other states or countries seize the opportunity first. Every major economic advancement has faced opposition, and there will always be those who oppose new infrastructure, ethanol, carbon capture, or modern agriculture itself. But when projects that create new markets are delayed indefinitely, it isn’t just private companies that lose. It’s farm families, ethanol plants, rural communities and the whole state economy.
The greatest opportunity for rural America isn’t another government handout. It’s creating new markets for the crops our farmers already grow. That’s how rural America has always prospered: not through government checks, but through innovation, investment and new customers.
The rest of the world is moving. The question is whether Iowa will seize this opportunity or continue allowing delay, bureaucracy and obstruction to leave our farmers behind.
Tom Buis grew up on a farm, worked in the U.S. House and Senate, led the National Farmers Union, and later became the first CEO of Growth Energy. He now serves as CEO of the American Carbon Alliance.
This article originally appeared on Des Moines Register: In aviation fuel, Iowa farmers are missing a unique market | Opinion
Reporting by Tom Buis, Guest columnist / Des Moines Register
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Tom Buis, Guest columnist | USA TODAY Network
