Trump’s Iran war is pushing American farmers to the brink

The rain in Windsor, North Carolinais manner not on time. Despite the seat of Bertie County being crisscrossed with rivers and creeks and mendacity on the estuary of the Albemarle Sound, native farmer Charles Harden reckons the space is affected by a 12-inch rain shortfall in the first 5 months of 2026.

“It’s been terrible dry,” Harden advised Salon. Windsor usually will get about 50 inches of rain a 12 months. That’s unhealthy information for his firm, Clovergrass Produce, and his crop of soybeans, cucumbers, peanuts and corn plus his herd of beef cattle. “We’re starting off this year in a drought,” Harden mentioned. “We ended last year in a drought.”

“Right now is harder than any time in the history of our country for agriculture,” Harden mentioned. He ought to have some concept of ​​arduous occasions — Harden is a ninth-generation North Carolinian farmer, his household having been in Bertie County since 1771.

“We’ve been through a Revolutionary War, a Civil War, two world wars, and two depressions,” Harden mentioned. “So we’ve seen it all.”

Things have been already troublesome for unbiased producers like the Harden household, who had to climate the whims of company farming operations and distributors. The earlier 12 months had seen farmers throughout the nation wrestle to preserve their heads above water in the wake of President Donald Trump’s tariff insurance policies and subsequent agricultural trade war with China. A subsequent $12 billion relief package from the Trump administration helped avert complete catastrophe.

Then, Trump joined Israel in war against Iraninflicting commerce by the Strait of Hormuz to come to a screeching halt. Prices of every little thing from plastics and helium to fertilizer merchandise have skyrocketed. About half of the world’s agricultural nitrogen-based urea fertilizer provide passes by the strait, together with 30% of world ammonia exports.

The value of chemical compounds essential to produce fertilizer — phosphorus, nitrogen and ammonia, amongst others — has risen sharply since the begin of the war, placing much more stress on the nation’s small and unbiased farmers and producers. When the Iranian war started, fertilizer costs jumped from round $400 per ton in early February to almost $600 per ton in early March. It’s solely risen since then.

This could be an issue in every other 12 months, however this 12 months is particularly unhealthy. Coming off of 2025, market volatility noticed farmers throughout the nation hesitant to purchase their 12 months’s fertilizer early, opting as a substitute to purchase it nearer to the begin of the spring rising season. What had been an costly fertilizer grew to become unaffordable for a lot of, even after accounting for the Trump administration’s bailout to farmers.

“Everybody gets it and immediately pays creditors, whether it be on the input side or the banks,” Harden defined. “That’s what everybody’s doing, because they have to… We’re all trying to figure out these ways to pay people back when we’re not making money.”

“You can give us all the money you want,” he mentioned. “It’s not going to direct back into an independent market to create domestic revenue.”

An April report From the American Farm Bureau Federation discovered that 70% of the nation’s farmers can not afford the fertilizer wanted to function one other 12 months. The drawback is particularly acute in the Southeastern US, the place simply 19% of farmers and producers pre-booked their fertilizer shipments prior to the Iran war. As such, a whopping 78% report being unable to afford all the fertilizer they want.

Mitt Walker, director of nationwide affairs at the Alabama Farmers Federation, says the area’s farmers are below “significant strain.”

“Many producers are being forced to make difficult decisions about input use, crop selection, and long-term investment, which may ultimately affect yields, profitability and farm viability,” he mentioned in an announcement to Salon.

Mike McCormick, president of the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation, is grateful for what assist the Trump administration can present, however harassed that farmers in Mississippi “need relief.”

“At the end of the day, farmers simply want to raise a crop and sell it and earn enough to support their family and cover their bottom line,” McCormick mentioned in an announcement to Salon, calling the scenario for farmers “very difficult.”

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Josh Linville, vp of fertilizer at monetary providers firm Stone

“When you look at the fertilizer situation, we’ve never seen anything nearly as bad as what we are today,” Linville advised Salon, noting that the war in Iran has made the fertilizer scenario even worse. China, which provides 10% of the world’s fertilizer exports, clamped down on its exports in February and tightened them additional in April, contributing to the rising prices. Linville thinks China won’t reverse the ban till August 2026, properly after the bulk of the planting season.

In the meantime, Linville proposes short-term federal funds to farmers to assist them survive the 12 months, though he is “not a big fan” of the apply.

“Unfortunately, this entire situation is not the farmer’s fault,” he mentioned. “So, because this is a government-driven situation, and the American farmer is being impacted more than most other industries out there, it justifies a payment.”

For its half, the Trump administration is in search of methods to decrease fertilizer prices. When requested for remark, the Department of Agriculture pointed Salon to a latest op-ed from Secretary of Agriculture, Brooke Rollins.

“The Trump administration has already taken bold actions to make fertilizer more affordable and accessible for our farmers in the short-term,” Rollins wrote, noting Trump’s 150-day suspension of the Jones Actwhich might permit fertilizer to transfer by the US with extra flexibility.

Along with this, Rollins celebrated Trump for “urging” fertilizer corporations to prioritize American consumers and permit farmers to lock in fertilizer costs by 2028.

“At the same time, we are also working to rebuild domestic production capacity in the long-term,” she wrote. “Several ongoing projects are expected to reach major construction benchmarks in the coming year, and early estimates suggest these facilities will supercharge our domestic production capacity as they begin operation,” although clarified that the advantages wouldn’t seem “overnight.”

Linville referred to as it a “multi-year process,” even when laws are eliminated to velocity up the buildup of a home stockpile. Indeed, one trade report States {that a} single fertilizer-producing facility takes three to 4 years to construct and fill to capability, noting {that a} new ammonia plant in Louisiana started building in 2025, with full operation anticipated in 2029.

Moreover, he thinks Rollins’ goal of accelerating nitrogen manufacturing by 30% wouldn’t go to farmers however to current “industrial demands” and different power initiatives, reminiscent of gas for delivery vessels. Linville has a unique concept: improve competitors in fertilizer suppliers.

“If we can provide some sort of financing package for a new company to build a new nitrogen production facility, not only do you increase supply, you also increase competition,” he mentioned. “It’s a win-win for the farmer.”

As it stands, the fertilizer market is small, with North American corporations like Nutrien, Mosaic, and CF Industries accounting for greater than $50 billion in international market cap house. The US itself produces 53 million tons of fertilizer.

“The market’s not working the way it should. … These major producers have really worked to restrict and limit access for any competitors to get into the market,” Sarah Carden, the analysis and coverage director at Farm Action, advised Salon.

The federal authorities has had considerations about the lack of market competition for years. Recently, the Department of Justice announced it was investigating whether or not fertilizer corporations in the US have engaged in years of price-fixing. TO separate lawsuit in Colorado accuses a few of the largest home producers of the identical cost.

Back in Windsor, North Carolina, Harden says there is nearly no competitors. “They just can’t compete, and it’s really affecting us,” he mentioned of native fertilizer producers, typically topic to buyouts. “We had a company that had been here since 1939 that specialized in fertilizer, and they’re gone.”

The USDA has additionally suggested that farmers swap to much less nitrogen-intensive crops, like soybeans, and to reduce on their fertilizer utilization. Carden, who runs an natural vegetable farm, mentioned that type of swap is not really easy. “A lot of operations aren’t that nimble,” she mentioned. “If you reduce your application rates, you’re going to look at yield losses. So, it’s a really challenging calculation on that front.”

Carden, like nearly each farmer in the nation, is coping with yet one more monetary burden from the Iran war in the type of skyrocketing diesel gas costs.

“Our freight expenses are really bad right now. So, all of our shipping costs, and then diesel, have hit us really hard,” she mentioned.

Diesel prices have risen by 54.4% nationwide since the begin of the Iran war, in accordance to a real-time fuel cost tracker from Brown University, which calculated the common value of a gallon of diesel on May 14 at $5.67. Across many counties of the fertilizer-strapped southeast, diesel gas prices have risen by more than 50%. In response, Trump has referred to as for ending the federal gas tax to decrease prices for Americans, although at the value of chopping federal freeway funds by billions of {dollars}.

Like Linville, Carden would not see many short-term fixes. Carden would not need taxpayers on the hook for billions extra in aid funds, so she proposes utilizing the Defense Production Act as an answer.

Last used during the COVID-19 pandemicinvoking the act would make the chemical compounds essential for fertilizer a nationwide protection precedence. Doing so would “give the federal government more authority to monitor supply, prevent hoarding and help stabilize the market,” in accordance to Carden.

Still, farmers are caught between a rock and a tough place. If meals prices go up, shoppers spend much less. “Our customers are just not willing to absorb any price increases,” Carden mentioned.

However, if fertilizer prices stay excessive, farmers danger spending more cash placing chemical compounds into the floor than they’re going to get for what comes out of it.

“This isn’t a one-to-one ratio,” Carden explains, “but if you’re a farmer and you’re looking at this, you don’t see a lot of hope looking forward.”

Charles Harden places little religion in the Trump administration, accusing him of talking solely with “corporate farmers” and calling the president “narrow-minded.”

“They don’t want these real farmers there, like me, because we’re going to tell them the truth, and they don’t want to hear the truth,” he mentioned. “They’ve shown me no clear path forward. I see none.”

For him, the stresses he faces are “enormous,” with 2026 gearing up to be worse than 2025. He says he “can’t shut down” when he goes residence at night time, nervous about paying his mounting payments, and says the fixed bodily and psychological pressure has taken years off his physique.

Last 12 months, Harden and his spouse welcomed their second baby, a son, into the household. His son hung out in the NICU and was quickly recognized with a extreme genetic dysfunction that causes cerebral palsy. His son’s medical bills are by no means removed from Harden’s thoughts, together with an ever-growing laundry listing of considerations.

“I’m sitting here thinking, how am I gonna pay for my son?” he asks.

“I don’t even know if I can go buy groceries at the end of the year,” he mentioned. “We shouldn’t have to live like that. You know, none of us is asking to be rich. We’re just asking to make a living.”