By Hannah Baker
In a recent Southern Ag Today article, the trends in farm operating costs over the last few years were discussed based on data released by the USDA Economic Research Service (ERS) in May. The article focused mainly on row crops, but the data also includes operating costs for cow-calf production. So, the focus of this article will be looking at historical cow-calf production costs combined with forecasted costs for 2025 and 2026 from the Livestock Marketing Information Center.
Over the last five years, cow-calf operating costs per head have increased by 29 percent nationally, according to data from the ERS and LMIC. Looking back at the 10-year average (2015-2024), annual operating costs for a cow-calf operation have been $602.53 per head (does not include pasture rent) according to ERS survey data.
Source : osu.edu