News, Insights & Interviews Archive

With the United States in the middle of a fierce debate on which immigrants should be allowed to legally remain and work in the United States, people like Sharon Krause is focused on opportunities for those committed to making a living on the farm. Should all people who entered the country illegally be forced to leave? Should only those who have violent criminal records be removed? Should everyone who overstayed a temporary visa get deported? Those questions and others have d

The family farm required the same characteristic that helped Joshua Manske thrive on the golf course: patience. Agriculture was never really something Manske left behind. But it was something that patiently waited for him to return.

How widespread is the opposition from people who don’t want farmland converted to data centers, are concerned about the water use from those facilities, oppose taxpayer subsidies for data centers, or a combination of those three complaints? It is so much so that nearly one in four states have considered moratorium legislation on new data centers, according to Good Jobs First , a nonprofit organization that tracks government subsidies, actions that it considers corporate misco

In the years ahead, America will need far more power generated than we currently produce. Our ever-increasing hunger for technology – and the power that it takes to operate that technology – demand it. Wind, solar, natural gas, coal and nuclear could be all among the options to produce some of that additional capacity. Data centers could be an integral part of the nation’s economy for the infrastructure to provide the storage, processing, internet, and distribution system to

President Donald Trump is trying to protect glyphosate, one of the most widely used and effective herbicides. Meanwhile, Bayer is trying to protect its business interests by offering billions of dollars to settle a class action lawsuit that claims that Roundup is making people seriously ill. President Trump’s executive order  invoked the Defense Production Act to ensure continued U.S. production of elemental phosphorus and glyphosate-based herbicides, arguing that both are es

When an 86-year-old farmer along the Route 81 corridor in central Pennsylvania was offered roughly $60,000 an acre for his land, the math was staggering. At 261 acres, the total approached $15 million.

At a time when cattle ranchers are deciding whether to replenish herds and wondering how additional beef imports from Argentina will impact the market, they are reading headlines about what investigators say has been massive fraud by a company based in Fort Worth, Texas, that collected more than $220 million. The new development is the latest in a series since 2023 that alleged improprieties by Agridime LLC. This Fort Worth Star-Telegram article   has more on the background

Listen on Spotify | Apple Podcasts Farms are getting bigger, and there are fewer farms each year. Those changes have taken place over a number of years. But Dennis Reyman, Partner at Stalcup Agricultural Services in Storm Lake, Iowa, said one factor remains constant in a constantly changing agricultural industry: farmers are still doing most of the farm buying. “…as far as land ownership, the trends are kind of the same as they usually are,” Reyman told American Farmland Ow

Joel Salatin speaking at the 2026 Land Investment Expo Joel Salatin does not take a conventional approach. While discussing agriculture young people love, Salatin was an atypical figure on the stage at the lunch keynote session of the 2026 Land Investment Expo in Des Moines, Iowa.  Salatin is a self-proclaimed “Christian, libertarian, environmentalist, capitalist, lunatic farmer.” He even sells “lunatic farmer’ t-shirts as part of his merchandising line. Lunatic Farmer t-shir

A 154-acre farm near Indianola, Iowa, sold at auction this January for $1.54 million, but it wasn’t a typical land sale. Along with the ground came one important condition: the longtime owner, Gwen Hodson, 93, will be allowed to remain in the farmhouse for the rest of her life.

No growth provides no future. Negative growth brings even more problems. But too much growth could bring issues, too. That is how Wyoming State Representative Jacob Wassenburger, R - Cheyenne, sees it.

After complaining about not getting awarded a Nobel Peace Prize, President Donald Trump later announced 10% tariffs against Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland. The countries opposed Trump’s threats to take over Greenland, which would violate the principles of the countries’ long-standing NATO alliance.  Trump threatened the tariffs until, “a deal is reached for the complete and total purchase of Greenland.” However, he la

After a 15-year absence, whole milk is set to return to school lunches. President Donald Trump signed the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act of 2025  into law. The law marks a significant shift in federal school nutrition policy and has been welcomed by dairy producers, rural advocates, and policymakers who see it as a boost to the dairy sector and an expansion of choice for school nutrition programs.  Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Acts of 2025 The 2010 Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids A

There is a new number one on the list of the nation’s leading landowners in the United States. If you don’t recognize the name, Stan Kroenke, you are probably at least familiar with some of the sports teams he owns: the NBA’s Denver Nuggets, the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams, and the NHL’s Colorado Avalanche. The sports and entertainment mogul now owns 2.7 million acres of private land, consisting mostly of cattle ranches, according to the new Land Report 100  list. Kroenke was numb

Sharon Krause believes that the future of agriculture is close to home. “From an environmental perspective, the more food that we can grow closer to home, the more we reduce our costs between transportation and storage,” Krause told American Farmland Owner.

Listen on Spotify or Apple Podcast For many farm owners today, the question isn’t whether change is coming; it’s how to respond to it without jeopardizing everything they have built. Commodity markets remain volatile, input costs stay stubbornly high, and consolidation continues to squeeze margins. Virginia farmer, author, and outspoken agricultural thinker Joel Salatin offers a significantly different perspective for thinking about growth, resilience, and transition. Joel S

American farmer’s counterparts “across the pond” face challenges in 2026. Farm profitability in England has been tested by extreme weather, volatile commodity markets, subsidy reforms, and structural challenges in profitability that have left many producers and policymakers grappling with the future of farming economics in the U.K. A Financial Times analysis reported that food production has become unprofitable for a significant portion of English farms. The article noted tha

A new year has delivered a new food pyramid from the Trump administration, and we will see how it impacts what Americans buy from farmers. On January 7th, the U.S. Departments of Agriculture (USDA) and Health and Human Services (HHS) unveiled an updated Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2025–2030. It was complete with a redesigned food pyramid that departs sharply from models of the past. This policy shift, centered on a message to “eat real food,”  could have significant impl

MAHA, Make America Healthy Again, will influence America’s food system in 2026, although it may be too early to know how deeply. U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert Kennedy, Junior, has made a host of claims about ultra-processed foods, synthetic dyes, and pesticides and discussed thematic changes to better promote good health in Americans, especially children. President Donald Trump signed an executive order in February 2025 that created the MAHA Commission. I

The holidays bring heightened attention to mental health and stress. Mental health struggles in rural communities, particularly among farmers and ranchers, have long been hidden behind a culture of toughness and self-reliance. Washington State Representative Tom Dent, Republican from Moses Lake, has worked to increase awareness and resources for his fellow rural ranchers and farmers and get more people to understand that growing pressures facing agriculture makes addressing m