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On a recent morning just after milking, Glendon Mehuren II, an organic dairy farmer in Searsmont, was weighing whether to buy diesel fuel.
The cheapest diesel Mehuren found was $4.53 per gallon for the off-road diesel fuel used in farm equipment, he said Thursday. That’s about 50 to 60% more than he was paying last year and he was debating whether to buy it now or wait and see if the price goes down.
“It’s kind of like gambling,” he said as his pet goose, Mr. Noisy, followed close at his heels. “Do you fill the tank in case it takes a big jump, which I don’t think is that unrealistic?”
Mehuren, who with his family owns and operates Faithful Venture Farm, grows more than 100 acres of grass for the herd, and relies on diesel-powered equipment to produce hay. Those record-high fuel prices, driven by the U.S.-led war in Iran, are only the latest example of soaring costs squeezing farmers and the people who buy their food.
Many Maine farmers are making tough choices as the prices of everything from fuel to feed to health care go up, said Bill Pluecker, who is a farmer, a state representative and the public policy organizer for the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association.
“We’re already stretched thin,” he said. “So, undoubtedly, this is going to be a huge problem.”
And the price spikes come at a time when many of the federal programs that support farmers have shrunk and state programs are strapped. “We were already facing the loss of farms and loss of farm acreage, and I think it’s going to continue this coming year,” Pluecker said.
Jonathan Tibbetts, vice president of the Maine Farm Bureau, said the spike in fuel prices has hit at the worst possible moment for many growers. In the early spring, farmers are making decisions for the coming season, and there are many costs and not much income.
He runs a diversified business in Lyman that includes beef cattle, hay, a greenhouse and a flock of sheep that graze around solar panels.
Electricity costs have been a big struggle, he said. Five or six years ago, he paid about $700 a month for power. Now he pays between $2,500 to $3,000. He expects that buying fertilizer later this season will be an issue. The American Farm Bureau Federation recently reported that nitrogen fertilizer prices are up 30 percent since the escalation of tensions in the Middle East.
Already, Tibbetts has had to raise his meat prices and his prices for loam and compost. And if fuel costs don’t drop significantly, he expects he’ll have to charge more for hay.
But he knows raising prices comes with a risk, as his customers are also feeling squeezed.
“At a certain point, there’s going to be a breaking point for consumers,” he said. “Because their costs are going up, too. At some point they’re not going to buy hanging baskets or work in their garden.”
Jamie Cermak, the marketing manager at the Belfast Community Co-op, said that prices are trending up and the store’s buyers are seeing fuel surcharges added on to certain products, which often precede more lasting price hikes.
Grocery stores run on razor thin margins, he said, but concerns over the affordability of food are “always at the forefront” at the co-op. The store has been redoubling its efforts to make food more accessible, particularly since SNAP benefits were cut, by donating more food and distributing grocery boxes to its own employees.
Faced with rising prices, shoppers are buying more in bulk, Cermak said, because the co-op offers a 15% discount on preorders of cases and other large sizes. Cermak said it’s hard to tell if customers are shying away from buying more expensive items, because some people may find that cooking nice meals at home is a more affordable luxury than dining out.
Running an independent grocery store is already tough, Cermak said. And the affordability crisis doesn’t help.
“It’s making a complicated situation even more complicated,” he said.
Cermak hopes that increasingly cost-wary consumers will continue to support local farmers markets and grocery stores. Because even if bigger grocers can sell some products for cheaper, they often are less invested in taking care of their workers and the community.
As she left the co-op holding a bag of locally grown salad greens, Belfast resident Donna Durkin said that she’s actively cutting back on her grocery bills, by buying less fancy cheese and just buying less food in general. But she is still prioritizing buying local produce.
She likes to support local farmers, especially since her daughter is one, and she says the flavor of locally grown food makes the higher price worth it. Durkin tries to shop at the co-op because she knows it pays farmers better prices than large grocery stores.
“Do a lot of people have that choice? No,” she said. “I’m recently unemployed, so maybe in a couple weeks I won’t [either].”
For now, farmers are left trying to cope with high prices where they can. Sometimes that means getting creative.
Until a few years ago, Pluecker would start his seedlings in a propane-heated greenhouse at his farm in Warren. Now, the seedlings grow in his house — his living room and kitchen are currently filled with thousands of young plants.
For Mehuren and his wife, Jodie, bartering has become a way to work around high and erratic prices. They recently paid for part of their children’s checkups with maple syrup. And they’re going to trade meat and syrup for bookkeeping services.
“There’s a value to goods that the money doesn’t hold anymore, because it fluctuates and because of inflation,” Jodie Mehuren said. Making a gallon of syrup or honey takes the same amount of effort, no matter how much it sells for, she said.
“Those hold their intrinsic value where money doesn’t,” she said.
But in many cases, farmers have no choice but to pay up and hope for the best. Pluecker has seen dairy farmers pay extremely high prices for feed because their only alternative was selling off cows.
Glendon Mehuren needs to fix a baler, which uses six belts. Last year, each belt cost about $650. This year, they’re selling for around $850.
His wife says she’s spending more to plant her garden this year, because fuel costs have raised shipping rates for seeds.
“It trickles down to everything else,” she said. “There’s nothing you can do about it. You just have to absorb it and keep going.”
After the milking parlor and equipment was scrubbed down and the calves were fed, a fuel delivery truck pulled up to Faithful Venture farm.
Glendon Mehuren asked the driver if he thought prices were going to go up or down. Down, the driver told him. So Mehuren decided to trust the driver’s prediction and get 100 gallons of diesel now. Hopefully, the situation in the Middle East will calm down and he’ll be able to get more at a lower price sometime soon.
“But,” he growled. “If anything over there blows up tomorrow and it goes up to $8 a gallon, I’m gonna say ‘that friggin guy!’”
