MOULTRIE — For most crops, prices are at the same level they were 25 years ago — or even below — while the cost of production has doubled, said a local University of Georgia extension agent.

For many years advances in production efficiency and increased yields allowed farmers to keep their heads above water as production cost increased. The cost of production continues to increase, but it is unlikely that Colquitt County will see much improvement in market prices under current world marketing systems, County Agent Scott Brown said Friday.

For a number of years now, U.S. agriculture has competed in the global market place, resulting in reduced market share for U.S. producers, Brown said. This has had tremendous effects on prices. Global prices do not respond to domestic production disasters as prices did 25 years ago. Not only are these foreign producers competing for market share, but also as they prosper and develop they are competing directly with U.S. producers for the raw inputs, such as fertilizer sources, required to produce a crop, he said.

These foreign competitors were just a few years ago buyers of U.S. agriculture products, Brown pointed out. Now, these markets are gone and will never return, he said.

As bad as all the above sounds, they are moot points to row crop production, he said, in the absence of federal farm programs. Should American producers lose these programs, farming as currently known in Colquitt County would cease to exist, he said.

From a business perspective, agriculture is still the major engine that drives the wheels of the Colquitt County economy, and federal farm programs are a major stabilizing force in the economic harmony of this community. In three out of the last five years, Colquitt County producers have experienced three record-yielding cotton crops and two record-yielding peanut crops.

But due to low prices, Brown said, only one out of the past five years have been profitable to cotton producers not participating in farm programs.

Changes in the peanut program also have damaged the profitability of peanuts over the past 12 to 24 months, he said.

Colquitt County has an annual raw agricultural product value in excess of $200 million that supports many dozens of agricultural businesses providing many hundreds of jobs. Agriculture, agribusiness and farm and forest lands support a major portion of the local tax base. The loss of farm programs or even a reduction in their current form stands to severely damage the overall economy of Colquitt County, Brown said.

Farm programs are being attacked from numerous angles, he said. Competition for the federal tax dollar in Washington is not the least of these. Many foreign countries demand reductions in U.S. farm subsidies on the grounds that these subsidies give American producers an unfair advantage in the global market. There are even arguments among legislators and across commodity groups about equity in farm subsidies. Unless the current mindset changes, Brown thinks in all likelihood the U.S. will see major changes in the federal support of farm programs in the next few years.

“We would do well to remember the lesson we have just had on what can happen when you depend heavily on non-domestic crude oil and your domestic supply is disrupted by some natural disaster — high prices at the pumps,” he said. “Without commodity subsidies to ensure our food and fiber supply the 15 percent of our disposable income we spend on food could double or triple in the face of a major disruption of domestic supply. Farm programs are the reason we pay much less for our food than most of the world and are as much a part of our national security as our armies are.”