crop budgets – Maryland Agronomy News

UMD Grain Marketing Site Updated for 2024: Field Crop Budgets

Shannon Dill, Principal Agriculture Agent | sdill@umd.edu
University of Maryland Extension, Talbot County

The University of Maryland Extension has updated www.go.umd.edu/grainmarketing site with new input data and spray programs for the 2024 field crop budgets.

Crop Budgets

Cost of production is very important when making decisions related to your farm enterprise and grain marketing. Preliminary surveys from 2024 UME Winter Crop Production meetings report 66% of farmers believe input costs are the greatest challenges facing their farm operation. Enterprise budgets provide valuable information regarding individual enterprises on the farm. This tool enables farm managers to make decisions regarding enterprises and plan for the coming production year. An enterprise budget uses farm revenue, variable cost, fixed cost, and net income to provide a clear picture of the financial health of each farm enterprise.

The 2024 Maryland enterprise budgets were developed using average yields and estimated input costs based on producer and farm supplier data. Fertilizer prices, pesticide availability, and fuel expenses have fluctuated greatly. The figures presented are averages and vary greatly from one farm and region to the other. It is, therefore, crucial to input actual farm data when completing enterprise budgets for your farm.

Cost Per Acre, 2024
Year	Corn No Till	Corn Conventional	Soybeans	Wheat	Wheat/Beans
2021	$540	$592	$346	$401	$608
2023	$736	$800	$423	$538	$800
2024	$690	$749	$410	$514	$752
Difference 23-24	-$46	-$51	-$13	-$24	-$48
Percent Change	-6%	-6%	-3%	-4%	-6%

How to Use University Enterprise Budgets

The enterprise budgets can be used as a baseline for your operation, and you can change these budgets to include your production techniques, inputs, and overall management. The budgets are available electronically in PDF or Excel. Use this document as a start or reference to create your crop budgets. Contact information is on the website if you have problems downloading any information.

2024 Crop Summary

Cost per acre expenses for 2024 have decreased a small amount from 2023 record highs. Based on estimates received cost of production includes: corn no-till costs $690 per acre, corn conventional $749 per acre, soybeans $410 per acre and wheat $514 per acre. While these are slightly (3-6%) lower than 2023 they are still 16%-22% higher than prices just 3 years ago (2021).

MD Grain Marketing Site Updated for 2023: Field Crop Budgets and Custom Rates

Shannon Dill, Principal Agriculture Agent
University of Maryland Extension, Talbot County

The University of Maryland Extension has updated the grain marketing website (www.go.umd.edu/grainmarketing) with new input data and spray programs for the 2023 field crop budgets. Also posted is the recent 2023 Maryland and Delaware Custom Rate Survey.

Crop Budgets

Cost of production is essential when making decisions about your farm enterprise and grain marketing. Enterprise budgets provide valuable information regarding individual enterprises on the farm. An enterprise budget uses farm revenue, variable cost, fixed cost, and net income to provide a clear picture of the financial health of each farm enterprise. This tool enables farm managers to make decisions regarding enterprises and plan for the coming production year.

The 2023 Maryland enterprise budgets were developed using average yields and estimated input costs based on producer and farm supplier data. The figures presented are averages and vary significantly from one farm and region to the other. It is, therefore, crucial to input actual farm data when completing enterprise budgets for your farm.

Cost Per Acre 2023
	Corn – No Till	Corn – Conventional	Soybeans	Wheat	Wheat/Beans
2022	$689.00	$749.00	$402.00	$490.00	$749.00
2023	$735.50	$799.57	$422.86	$537.64	$800.23
Difference	$46.50	$50.57	$20.86	$47.64	$51.23
Percent Change	7%	7%	5%	10%	7%

How to Use University Enterprise Budgets:

The enterprise budgets can be used as a baseline for your operation. Make changes to these budgets to include your production techniques, inputs, and overall management.

Use this document as a start or reference to creating your crop budgets. The budgets are available electronically in PDF or Excel online at www.extension.umd.edu/grainmarketing. Contact information is on the website if you have problems downloading any of these budgets.

2023 Custom Rate Survey Now Available for Maryland and Delaware

Financial and economic considerations such as limited capital, untimely cash flow, low labor, small acreage, or other reasons require farmers to hire custom services for field operations.

Custom work charges are determined by demand and supply and are negotiated between farmers and custom operators. The purpose of the publication is to provide information on custom work charges in Maryland and Delaware.

Custom Work Charges

A mail survey was conducted in the fall of 2022 to determine custom works charges in Maryland and Delaware. Rates were collected from 67 custom operators and farmers and summarized for the state. Participants indicated the rates they charge for various field operations. The charges reported in this publication may serve as a guide in determining an acceptable rate for a particular job where little other information is available. The charges can also be compared with costs and returns and may be used as a basis for working out more equitable charges for both the custom operator and the customer. These are available online at www.go.umd.edu/grainmarketing or contact your local Extension Office.

Operation	AVERAGE ’23	AVERAGE ’21	Percent Change
Field Preparation	$20.21	$19.07	6%
Planting	$21.87	$18.31	19%
Field Applications	$14.09	$9.84	43%
Forage Production	$15.17	$12.32	23%
Harvesting	$73.07	$71.30	2%
Labor	$42.19	$40.38	4%
Equipment Expenses	$85.50	$71.23	20%
Average Total Change	$38.87	$34.64	12%

*The accuracy of this survey depends on the number of realistic responses. If you would like to be added to the custom applicator list for future surveys, send your name and email/mailing address to sdill@umd.edu c/o MD Custom Rates.

Field Crop Budgets for 2022

Shannon Dill, Principal Agriculture Agent
University of Maryland Extension, Talbot County

The University of Maryland Extension has updated www.go.umd.edu/grainmarketing site with new input data and spray programs for the 2022 field crop budgets.

Crop Budgets

Cost of production is very important when making decisions related to your farm enterprise and grain marketing. Enterprise budgets provide valuable information regarding individual enterprises on the farm. This tool enables farm managers to make decisions regarding enterprises and plan for the coming production year. An enterprise budget uses farm revenue, variable cost, fixed cost and net income to provide a clear picture of the financial health of each farm enterprise.

The 2022 Maryland enterprise budgets were developed using average yields and estimated input cost based upon producer and farm supplier data. There has been a lot of fluctuation in fertilizer prices, pesticide availability and fuel expenses. The figures presented are averages and vary greatly from one farm and region to the other. Therefore, it is crucial to input actual farm data when completing enterprise budgets for your farm.

How to Use University Enterprise Budgets

Enterprise budgets can be used as a baseline for your operation. Make changes to these budgets to include your production techniques, inputs and overall management. New spray programs were added for herbicide resistant weeds.

The budgets are available electronically in PDF or Excel. Use this document as a start or reference to create your crop budgets. If you have problems downloading any of these budgets, contact information is located on the website.

Average Cost Per Acre, 2022
Year	Corn No Till	Corn Conventional	Full Season Soybeans	Wheat	Double Crop Wheat/Beans
2021	$540	$592	$346	$401	$608
2022	$698	$749	$402	$490	$749
Percent Change	+29%	+26%	+16%	+22%	+23%

New Web-Based Soybean Budget Tool

Alan Leslie, Agriculture Agent | aleslie@umd.edu
University of Maryland Extension, Charles County

With grant funding from the Maryland Soybean Board, we have been working to develop a new web-based app for calculating crop budgets for growing soybeans. The goal for this new tool is to allow farmers more freedom to customize inputs to better reflect their farming practices with a simple user interface. The web app allows you to download a summary of all inputs and expected profits as a PDF document for your records. The new crop budget tool can be found at: https://awleslie.shinyapps.io/budget_4/.

We are interested in gathering feedback and input about this new format and ways to improve it in the future. After testing the new crop budget tool, we would appreciate if you could take a few minutes to provide feedback through our online survey: https://ume.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_07bOf0994wyKzGd. Survey feedback will be used to develop better crop budget tools in the future.

MD Grain Marketing Site Updated for 2020: Field Crop Budgets and Custom Rates

Shannon Dill, Principal Agriculture Agent
University of Maryland Extension, Talbot County

The University of Maryland Extension has updated extension.umd.edu/grainmarketing site with new input data and spray programs for the 2020 field crop budgets.

Crop Budgets

The 2020 Maryland enterprise budgets were developed using average yields and estimated input cost based upon producer and farm supplier data. The figures presented are averages and vary greatly from one farm and region to the other. It is therefore crucial to input actual farm data when completing enterprise budgets for your farm.

How to Use University Enterprise Budgets:

The enterprise budgets can be used as a baseline for your operation. Make changes to these budgets to include your production techniques, inputs and overall management. New spray programs were added for herbicide resistant weeds.

The budgets are available electronically in PDF or Excel online at www.extension.umd.edu/grainmarketing. Use this document as a start or reference to create your crop budgets. If you have problems downloading any of these budgets, contact information is located on the website.

Cost Per Acre 2020
	Corn – No Till	Corn – Conventional	Soybeans	Wheat	Wheat/Beans
2020	$537.74	$593.58	$346.51	$424.80	$630.50
Increase	-5%	-4%	-5%	-3%	-4%

MD Grain Marketing Site Updated for 2019: Field Crop Budgets and Custom Rates

Shannon Dill, Extension Educator, Talbot County

The University of Maryland Extension has updated www.extension.umd.edu/grainmarketing site with new input data and spray programs for the 2019 field crop budgets. Also posted is the new 2019 Maryland Custom Rate Survey.

Crop Budgets

The 2019 Maryland enterprise budgets were developed using average yields and estimated input cost based upon producer and farm supplier data. The figures presented are averages and vary greatly from one farm and region to the other. It is therefore crucial to input actual farm data when completing enterprise budgets for your farm.

How to Use University Enterprise Budgets:

The enterprise budgets can be used as a baseline for your operation. Make changes to these budgets to include your production techniques, inputs and overall management.

Cost Per Acre 2019
	Corn – No Till	Corn – Conventional	Soybeans	Wheat	Wheat/Beans
2019	$564.05	$618.82	$363.37	$436.88	$656.03
Increase	7%	10%	2%	20%	3%

New spray programs were added for herbicide resistant weeds and budgets for Palmer amaranth control were added as well.

2019 Custom Rate Survey Now Available

Financial and economic considerations such as limited capital, untimely cash flow, insufficient labor, small acreage or other reasons require farmers to hire custom service for field operations.

Custom Work Charges

A mail survey was conducted in the fall of 2018 to determine custom works charges in Maryland. Rates were collected from 48 custom operators and farmers, and summarized for the state. Participants indicated the rates they charge for various field operations. The charges reported in this publication may serve as a guide in determining an acceptable rate for a particular job where little other information is available. The charges can also be compared with costs and returns and may be used as a basis for working out more equitable charges for both the custom operator and customer. These are available online at www.extension.umd.edu/grainmarketing or contact your local Extension Office.

Operation	AVERAGE ’19	AVERAGE ’17	Percent Change
Field Preparation	$20.29	$21.74	-7%
Planting	$20.38	$20.33	0%
Field Applications	$10.88	$11.41	-5%
Grass and Hay Production	$15.88	$13.11	17%
Harvesting	$72.70	$76.99	-6%
Labor	$32.34	$30.23	6%
Equipment Expenses	$62.78	$74.36	-18%
Average Total Change	$33.61	$35.45	-5%

The accuracy of this survey depends on the number of realistic responses. If you would like to be added to the custom applicator list for future surveys list send your name and mailing address to sdill@umd.edu c/o MD Custom Rates.

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