We all know it’s coming – big expensive bailouts for farmers.
Trump has done the impossible, by making consumers pay more than ever for food, while farmers still are going broke, and then forcing us to bail them out with funds from the added tariffs that we already paid.
There’s another way to go, that won’t completely solve the problem of toxic, clueless leadership, but would certainly help a lot of local farmers and rural communities – stop blocking farmers from siting more clean energy.
Tony Zartmann in the Toledo Blade:
As a Paulding County farmer for 25 years, a former Paulding County commissioner, and now the director of operations for the Ohio Conservative Energy Forum, I have seen firsthand how Ohio’s farmers are struggling with rising costs, low commodity prices, and the added pressures of state policies that limit their ability to stabilize their operations through renewable energy development.
The economic struggle in Ohio’s agricultural community is real — and getting worse every day.
The cost of farm inputs, the essential supplies needed to grow our food, has skyrocketed over the past two decades.
U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates show that production costs have increased by more than 220 percent during that period.
At the same time, commodity prices — the market value farmers can expect for their crops — remain stuck at levels last seen in 2007 to 2008.
Agriculture is unique in that farmers plant each season without knowing what price they will receive at harvest.
Imagine running any other business with no ability to predict your revenue — it would be unthinkable. Yet this gamble is the reality every Ohio farmer faces.
The financial squeeze has led to a massive consolidation of farms across the state.
In 1960, Ohio had about 124,000 individual farms. Today, that number has dropped to around 74,000 — a 40 percent decline.
Fewer, larger farms dominate, not because that’s healthier for the market, but because so many small and midsized family farms have been forced out.
As if rising costs and weak prices weren’t enough, severe drought conditions over the last two years have slashed yields even further.
Farmers have had less to sell, worsening already thin margins. The outcome is predictable: more foreclosures, more consolidation, and fewer family farms left to pass down to the next generation.
But there is a lifeline — renewable energy development. Leasing farmland for wind or solar projects can provide landowners with a stable, long-term source of income.
For many, it’s the one tool that can balance the books and ensure the farm survives for their children and grandchildren. In effect, energy leasing doesn’t just produce electricity — it helps preserve Ohio’s agricultural heritage.
Unfortunately, state lawmakers have made that option harder to access. Senate Bill 52 gives county officials the power to ban or block renewable energy projects — even when willing landowners want them. This is not just a policy misstep; it’s an erosion of fundamental private property rights. Both the U.S. and Ohio constitutions guarantee the rights of landownership, yet S.B. 52 prioritizes the opinions of neighbors over the rights of the property owner.
This should concern every Ohioan.
We are a society built on capitalism and entrepreneurship. Why should the government step in to stop a farmer from using their own land to support their livelihood? Why should property rights be subject to a popularity contest at the county level? And why, at a time when Ohio desperately needs more energy for economic growth, are we limiting clean energy development?
The bottom line is this: S.B. 52 punishes farmers at a time when they can least afford it. It pushes more families out of agriculture, accelerates consolidation, and strips away individual rights in the process. That’s not just a bad deal for farmers — it’s a bad deal for Ohio.
Lawmakers need to revisit and repeal this flawed legislation. Farmers deserve the freedom to make choices that sustain their operations, protect their families, and strengthen our energy future. Ohio’s agricultural legacy depends on it.
Mr. Zartman of Payne, Ohio, is a former Paulding County Commissioner for 12 years, and director of operations for Ohio Conservative Energy Forum.
The looming bailout is a refutation of the claim that tariffs are cost-free. They aren’t if, like soybean growers, you are the target of retaliation. Mr. Trump likes to say that tariffs are a windfall for the Treasury, but not if much of that revenue is going back out the door in subsidies to offset the tariff harm.
First Mr. Trump imposes tariffs that he says only hurt foreigners. But when that turns out not to be true, he takes political credit for payments to offset the damage as if he’s somehow protecting the American farmer. How about not hurting them in the first place?
The farm fiasco underscores another truth about tariffs, which is that they expand what Mr. Trump used to call “the swamp.” Industries and individual companies hit by tariffs are flocking to Washington to lobby for relief. The Beltway bandits on K Street have never had it so good.
UPDATE: I responded to Tony Zartman’s op-ed in the Toledo Blade, and my letter was published on October 12. This is how we stay engaged and continue communicating in local markets.
Peter Sinclair in the Toledo Blade:
I heartily agree with Tony Zartman that farmers should have the right to site clean energy, solar, and wind on their own land.
Farmers are in crisis because of tariffs and the resulting trade war, but farming has always been a risky business. Allowing farmers to diversify their incomes and bring on clean energy projects that will provide drought-proof, flood-proof, and trade war-proof revenue for 30 years in the future would be a God-send for hard pressed farmers.
Communities benefit as well. The Blade has reported on how Paulding County wind turbines have provided much needed revenue to local schools, improving student outcomes.
The same barriers exist in southeast Michigan, where two large solar projects, utilizing panels produced locally at First Solar in Perrysburg, would provide millions of dollars of badly needed revenue to hard pressed rural communities.
U.S. government statistics show that states with greater penetration of renewable energy tend to have lower electric rates.
Farmers are defending basic American values of property rights and free markets. They deserve our applause and support.
PETER SINCLAIR
Midland, Mich.
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I feel for these folks and it is stunning to me that the party of “small government”, “government hands off”, etc. are now in the business of deciding what a farmer can and cannot do with their land and especially when it is so patently weaponization of a political issue. having the land generate clean renewable energy helps the state and the country and the farmer… no logic to preventing that, especially when this is the same party that has shut down their biggest customer base. of course, i need to point out that most of us saw this coming and trump made it clear what he was going to do when in office, and indeed this is somewhat of a repeat of his last term…. given that, why did so many Ohioans vote for him? i wish the author had addressed that point. they are suffering at the hands of trump but there are hundreds of thousands of others across the country who also are or who will be… would love to hear some of these people admit that they were mislead
And the farmers get a bailout but the vast majority in this country get nothing but higher bills.
Why does this feel like a position a Soviet government would have got into? The next step is Lysenkoism