Sims said that when he started about 10 percent of his business was in grain bin construction and 90 percent in general farm construction work. About 10 years ago, the mix was about 50-50, he said.
“Now we’re doing about 90 percent grain systems.”
Sims’ is one of many agriculture-related businesses to have their work transformed by what’s happened on the economic front in prime corn country.
Madison County, where he’s located, ranked second in corn production among Ohio’s 88 counties last year with more than 15.5 million bushels. Bordering Champaign County, fifth in the state, harvested more than 14.3 million bushels.
Clark County ranked 20th at 10.8 million bushels.
All three counties harvested those crops on fewer acres than farmers planted 20 years ago, harvests made possible by higher corn yields.
Aside from increased yields, “there are a couple of things going on” to drive grain bin construction, said Tom Capehart of the USDA’s Economic Research Service.
“For one thing, we’ve had record corn production in the last few years, so there’s a lot of corn out there to store.”
Helped by ethanol plants, corn prices have been high enough that some farmers have shifted from planting wheat to corn in some areas and even planted corn on fields in consecutive years rather than rotating in a crop of soybeans.
With prices up, Capehart said, “farms are doing pretty well now, so they’ve got some money to spend” on storage systems to improve profitability.
Sims said a ready-to-use grain storage system usually sells for about $1.75 a bushel: $87,500 for a 50,000-bushel bin or $175,000 for a 100,000-bushel bin.
Even at that cost, “the size of grain bins is increasing considerably,” Sims said.
The average bin of 30 years ago held 10,000 bushels, and 15 years ago about 20,000 bushels, he said.
“Now the average is close to 40,000 to 50,000 bushels, and we’ve even put 750,000-bushel grain bins on farms.”
The larger average bin size is the result of both higher yields and the larger scale of farm operations, he added.
Whereas small farmers once hauled the grain to the elevator in hopper wagons, “now everyone has a semi,” he said. “Most farmers have two or three.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 328-0368.
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