By Shamira Muhammad
Mississippi’s agriculture sector reported $9.5 billion worth in 2025, a number largely dominated by row crops.
“Soybeans is a billion dollars worth of that,” said Dr. Will Maples, PhD., an associate professor of Agricultural Economics at Mississippi State University. “It's by far the biggest row crop commodity we have this past year. We planted a lot of corn acres, $619 million of that as well. And then cotton was $330 million.”
However, the state’s row crop agricultural sector is facing various economic pressures as the planting season begins.
Last year, when farmers across the country and Mississippi faced tighter margins caused by the Trump administration’s broad tariff policy, many pulled back acreage for bean crops because of the trade wars born from the situation. Mississippi exports most of its soybeans to China, which is also a major competitor in the trade war.
“That has definitely had a negative impact on the soybean market,” said Maples. “Producers have been struggling with prices and because our exports to China had been down 80-something percent on soybeans due to the kind of the tariff and trade war.”
While Maples expects farmers in the state to plant more soybeans this year to balance out last year’s high corn output, input costs haven’t helped either. The costs of certain materials after the pandemic skyrocketed, including machinery. Maples said while those prices leveled out, tariffs caused the cost of steel, aluminum and chemicals used in farming to rise steeply. The war in Iran has complicated the costs of various products.
“The Middle East right now with how it's spiked diesel fuel prices, I mean, as we get into planning, producers that haven't booked diesel or anything, they're definitely facing higher diesel prices,” said Maples.
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