Farmer Mac: Bankruptcy Rates Low
In its quarterly financial report, The Feed, ag bank Farmer Mac answered the question of whether prices and the farm economy will offer enough support to keep producers in business. Bankruptcies are one of several topics explored by the report.
Chapter 12 bankruptcy filings have remained relatively low during the past decade, but the agricultural downturn in the past three years has resulted in a small uptick in farm bankruptcy rates.
“It’s not systematic—it’s not all located in one region or one commodity,” says Jackson Takach, Farmer Mac economist. “We’ve seen maybe a very small uptick, but it’s not anywhere near what we saw in the Great Depression or after the 1980s farm crisis. That gives me a lot of good feelings about the ag economy.”
According to Farmer Mac, Nebraska, eastern California, central Georgia, Kansas and Wisconsin are areas where bankruptcies have been most common. Iowa and Missouri have had relatively fewer bankruptcies.
