According to a recent study by Purdue University, eight of 10 consumers say they have felt food inflation over the past year. While the rate of retail food inflation has slowed to about 2.2%, as compared with 4.4% a year ago, consumers are undoubtedly feeling the cumulative effect of COVID-era inflation.
It is logical to assume that rising food prices are due, at least in part, to farmers receiving higher prices for the food they raise. As a fourth-generation farmer, I can tell you that the prices farmers receive are not the problem. For example, wheat today is $2 per bushel lower than it was in 2022, and corn is $3.50 per bushel lower today than in 2022.
I can also tell you that beginning with the COVID years, we saw huge increases in our costs to produce food, but these costs pale in comparison to what our own lawmakers have done to harm Colorado agriculture.
Three years ago, the Colorado General Assembly passed and Gov. Jared Polis signed into law Senate Bill 87, also known as the Agricultural Labor Rights and Responsibilities Act, or ALRRA.
This law contains sweeping changes for ag employers, including the requirement to pay overtime. Produce farmers earn nearly all their annual income in just a few months, requiring farmers and their employees to work very long hours in summer. Farm employees in all but a few states are exempt from overtime.
ALRRA changed this for Colorado farmers, who now pay employees overtime after 56 hours during peak season. To those not familiar with the realities of farmwork, it seems logical to pay farm employees overtime pay, but this new ALRRA provision is harming the farmer and the employee. Most farmers do not have the financial margin to pay overtime and must either hire additional employees or cut back on production.
Many Colorado ag employees come to Colorado under temporary work visas, a federal government program referred to as H-2A. The acute shortage of domestic farm workers has led many farms — large and small — to hire foreign workers through this program. H-2A employers pay federal government fees as well as the employee’s round-trip travel, housing and transportation during their time in the United States. Required by the H-2A program, Colorado employers this year will pay their H-2A employees a minimum of $16.63 per hour.
Thanks to the passage of ALRRA, these foreign workers are no longer able to maximize their earnings while away from their families. Most farm employees will have their work weeks limited to 56 or fewer hours during peak season, as compared with up to 80 hours they may have elected to work in the past. At $16.63 per hour, employees are seeing thinner paychecks, some as much as $400 less gross pay per week.
The rising cost of equipment, fertilizers, seed, packaging and other things farmers must buy to produce food and onerous laws such as ALRRA are causing net farm incomes to fall.
Another alarming statistic from the U.S. Department of Agriculture: The number of farms operating in the U.S. fell by 141,733 farms between 2017-2022. Colorado during this time lost 2,837 farms or 7.3% of its farmland.
Farmers love to grow your food, but we are tired. We are tired of over regulation. We are tired of lawmakers with no understanding of agriculture passing laws that hurt our ability to make a living. We are tired of consumers thinking that rising food costs mean farmers are making more money.
Fortunately, the water and the farmland we (and the bank) own have value. If we are unable to make a living raising food, it might make more sense for many farmers to sell, but where will that leave Coloradans accustomed to Rocky Ford melons, Pueblo chiles, Olathe sweet corn, Palisade peaches and so much other food they love?
Don’t blame the farmer for high food prices, but I ask you, who is to blame when there are no more farmers to grow food for Coloradans?
Chuck Hanagan of Hanagan Family Farms near Swink was born and raised on the family farm in the Arkansas Valley. He serves as president of the Colorado Fruit & Vegetable Growers Association and worked for USDA’s Farm Service Agency in Colorado for 34 years.
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