Chad Hart, associate professor, was interviewed in a May 29 Iowa Agribusiness Radio Network story, "Agricultural producers may now apply for coronavirus-related funding."
“We have seen Ag prices, across the board, slide down significantly because of the spread of the coronavirus and physical distancing responses we’ve had to put in place to tamp down the virus,” Hart said. “As you look at July corn futures, what we saw throughout this year is a downward movement in prices, significant, especially as we went through March and April, as COVID-19 was moving across the United States and affecting global markets.”
In a June 2 FactCheck.org story, "Examining Biden's Farm Bankruptcy Claim."
“The bankruptcy wave this year has roots that go back several years,” Chad E. Hart, an associate professor of economics and crop markets specialist at Iowa State University, told us in an email. Hart, of Iowa State University, said farmers have been in an economic slump since 2014. That’s when net farm income first started to fall.
“The farm balance sheet took its biggest hits in 2014 and 2015,” Hart said, “and for some farmers, the years since then have been a slow erosion of farm net worth (debts rising faster than incomes).”