With Corn Belt inching north, farm diversification gains momentum

CONCORDIA, Mo. — Corn and soybeans once covered Josh Payne’s farm as far as the eye could see. Tidy rows of green and brown marched across his 600 acres from spring to fall, kept in line by tillage and herbicide. Though Payne’s operation was the picture of modern agriculture, he could not shake a general dissatisfaction.

Today, Payne calls his farm “a messy, complex, diverse life worth living.” Gone are the corn and soy, replaced by a diversified farm that includes various animals, nuts and fruits. Young chestnut trees reach their limbs skyward. Dozens of sheep graze on native grasses in Payne’s front yard. And several brown cows lounge on rolling pasture in the distance.

“We're trying to rethink our food, and we're trying to regrow our land,” Payne said.

Payne is one of a small but growing number of Midwestern farmers re-evaluating how to manage their land as they face climate change, market shocks and other threats. Diverse farms like his made up only 10 to 15 percent of the roughly 2 million farms in the 2017 U.S. agricultural census.

Yet researchers predict these farms will become more common across the Midwest as climate change redraws the American agricultural map. Already, the Corn Belt — which traditionally spanned from Kansas to Ohio and from Missouri to the Dakotas, including Iowa — has shifted northwest, a trend that’s expected to continue.

The Midwest hasn’t frequently seen wildfires or hurricanes, but subtle shifts may make the cornfields that comprise traditional corn-soy rotations less productive. Already, heat waves, intense storms, droughts and other weather changes are causing crop damage of increasing magnitude.

Although many farmers would scoff at the idea of moving away from corn, some researchers are encouraging them to consider diversifying their crops.

Linda Prokopy, a professor who studies sustainable farming at Purdue University in Indiana, puts it in stark terms: “Growing corn and soybeans exclusively in the Midwest is not sustainable in the long run,” she said in a January magazine interview. “As the climate continues to change, corn is not expected to yield very well in this area.”

Dennis Todey, director of the Midwest Climate Hub, a USDA research center in Ames, says the main reason for the Corn Belt’s agricultural productivity is regular rainfall during the summer. This rain can make up for a lack of regional irrigation.

“If we start to move to where we are more frequently drier in the summertime, then corn and soybean yields will likely suffer,” Todey said.

Prokopy said that this is the time for Corn Belt farmers to plan for the future. “I would tell them to start thinking about transitioning now,” she said.

The change of business models was not a light lifestyle decision for Payne. It was a big risk, a commitment to his children’s future on the farm and the health of the Mississippi River Basin. It was a chance to blaze a trail in his community and find future prosperity by looking to the past.

A cinching Corn Belt

Corn-soy rotations take up 75 percent of the farmland area in the Corn Belt region. Close to 90 million acres of corn were planted there this year, taking up an area nearly the size of Montana. That corn is mainly used for biofuels and animal feed.

Climate change is putting that landscape at risk. Corn is notoriously fertilizer-dependent and sensitive to temperature and moisture changes. One report projects regional crop yields to decrease as much as 40 percent from early-century levels by 2055.

Missouri, at the southern end of the Corn Belt, is a bellwether for a changing agricultural landscape. Current projections suggest it will be harder to maintain productive corn crops in the state’s future. A 2020 Missouri Soy report suggests it may be the hardest-hit Midwestern state by climate change.

Todey said the concerning projections have farmers looking for options. “I would say Missouri probably is going to be one of the places where we'll see that sooner,” Todey said.

Farm diversification is being held up as one answer. Diversification is the process of adding additional cash crops, livestock or other income sources to one’s land. Farmers might add a few acres of pecan trees to go with a cattle operation, or add winter wheat to a corn-soy annual rotation.

Prokopy was given a $10 million USDA-NIFA grant last October to study farm diversification as a climate solution for the Corn Belt. Her five-year research project will evaluate alternative farming systems, three-crop rotations and their environmental impacts for Midwest farms. Her emphasis will be on farms in Illinois, Indiana and Iowa.

The USDA is pumping an additional $1 billion into climate-resilient agriculture over the next five years. In February, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack rolled out the Partnership for Climate Smart Commodities program in Jefferson City, Mo. The program is designed to finance partnerships between government and community institutions for projects such as alternative crop market development.

“When you talk to farmers about diversification, they'll often say, ‘Well, that's what my grandfather used to farm,’” Prokopy said.

Diversified farms often use less chemical fertilizer, land and fuel than conventional farms. The model also offers prospects of improved profits, robust local food security, new jobs and economic resiliency in a changing climate.

“Diversifying across a larger set of crops helps to spread the risk,” said Sarah Lovell, director of the University of Missouri Center for Agroforestry. “So (farmers are) not all reliant on conditions required by one certain crop.”

Making change pay

What does it take for a farmer to make the leap? For Payne, it was a health crisis, a massive storm and a spiritual insight.

One day about 12 years ago, bored while on his self-driving tractor, Payne began reading the book “Surprised by Hope” by theologian N.T. Wright. The book rethinks the construct of heaven and bringing it about on Earth. “It helped me realize that the things that we do should be a part of bringing about hope and healing and regeneration to the world,” Payne said.

The book inspired Payne to begin looking into cover crops, or crops planted to cover the soil and prevent erosion. He got approval from his grandfather in 2012 after a massive storm destroyed a beanfield and had success increasing yields with the system.

Life handed him a new challenge in 2020. Payne discovered he was severely allergic to a common herbicide and petroleum-based fertilizers. It was an untenable situation for a conventional farmer. “It was either go back to teaching or change the way we farm completely,” Payne says.

In response, Payne began working on a plan for a regenerative sheep-and-chestnut farm — leading to where he is today.

And after more than a decade away from the family farm, Jordan, Josh, Josh’s wife Larin, and their three children have all returned to work with 93-year-old Charlie Payne.

“I think Grandpa is really proud that we decided to come back to the farm,” Jordan said. “It’s something that gets him choked up.”

Payne has become a convert, speaking at conferences about diversified farming. Farmers often ask him: Does it pay? Just two years into his new system, Payne said his margins are similar to what he had before with row crops. He earns a good profit from his livestock with lower costs than with row crops. He stands to gain as much as $6,000 per acre once the chestnut trees mature. Payne rents out the remaining 300 acres to a neighbor.

The farm currently supports two full-time jobs, and Payne hopes to add another 10 positions as he does his part in restoring the rural economy.

“When you get down to net profit, we're doing better than we did in row crops,” Payne said.

Planning the future of corn

Not everyone believes farmers will need to consider such drastic changes.

Ray Massey, a University of Missouri professor and agricultural economist, said he is skeptical of an impending row crop climate crisis. He argued most climate models “are more pessimistic than they need to be” because they account only for worst-case scenarios, and not for technological advances like new genetics or high-tech precision planters.

Jay Schutte, president of the Missouri Corn Growers Association, said that climate change effects have been incremental and that corn can adapt. He also said that genetically modified corn seeds are becoming more resistant to climate change.

For example, DuPont Pioneer, Syngenta and Bayer have developed seeds for increased extreme weather tolerance and nitrogen efficiency. Bayer will be commercially testing its short-stature corn in 2023, which grows to only two-thirds the size of conventional corn and is expected to enable better efficiency and extreme weather resilience.

While climate change is a concern, Schutte said farmers should keep growing corn because there’s a market for it.

“If I'm not paying my bills, I'm not going to be a farmer,” Schutte said. “It's just that simple. And corn and soybeans pay my bills.”

Prokopy said technology advances don’t eliminate the need for broad-scale change.

“Technology is part of the solution, and we will keep growing corn and soybeans,” Prokopy said. “But there's so much about climate change that we can't predict.”

USDA corn geneticist Jacob Washburn said intelligent choices will have to be made about what to plant and where.

“I think we can make corn that will grow and do well in pretty much any climate in the world,” he said. “But there are also many other crops that can possibly do well in those climates.”

Adam Goldstein is a master’s student at the University of Missouri School of Journalism.

This story is a product of the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an editorially independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri School of Journalism in partnership with Report For America and funded by the Walton Family Foundation.