New York (AFP)

Between exceptional floods in the spring and the trade war in full swing, the year is tough for American farmers. But if some sound the alarm, others relativize and still trust Donald Trump to support them.

The tenant of the White House has recently raised tensions with China and Beijing, in retaliation, suddenly announced Monday the cessation of all orders for agricultural products from the United States.

"A blow," says Zippy Duvall, president of the country's largest agricultural union, the Farm Bureau.

Exports to China, usually a big customer for US farmers, had already dropped from $ 19.5 billion to $ 9.1 billion in 2018. "Now we risk losing everything" this market, lamented the manager in a communicated.

Traveling Thursday in Iowa, in the heart of rural America that voted for Donald Trump in 2016, Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden was particularly catastrophic.

The trade war "will cause much more than financial problems (...), it will lead to many bankruptcies" in the agricultural world, he said.

- Stress -

According to Farm Bureau calculations, bankruptcies of farms were actually up 13% year-on-year at June 30, even though they had fallen slightly over the whole of 2018.

But the trade war is only one element among others, notes the document: "the deterioration in the financial conditions of farmers and pastoralists is a direct result of several years of low agricultural income, low returns on assets increasing levels of debt, natural disasters and the second year of retaliatory measures applied to many US agricultural products, "he said.

Above all, heavy rains in the spring and early summer flooded a large part of the fields, delaying planting for several weeks, or even completely preventing them.

Not only should yields be affected, but farmers are worried that plants, which are lagging behind in development, will be hit with early frosts in the fall.

"It's not uncommon to have losses because of the weather, but not necessarily of this magnitude," says Jamie Beyer, Wheaton, Minnesota's soybean, corn, sugar beet and sugar beet. alfalfa.

"It adds to the stress caused by trade tensions, because we know that if we had had a year with high yields and a large crop, the prices would have plummeted," she says.

- regain trust -

The farmers contacted by AFP all confirm that the situation is disparate.

"The luck factor and some good decisions play a lot," says John Reifsteck, who operates corn and soybeans in Illinois.

"Trade disputes, with China but also Mexico and Canada, undoubtedly weigh on the courts and we are stuck in the middle," he laments. But other factors also come into play, such as the fact that previous harvests were plentiful or that African swine fever has decimated a large part of the livestock in China, dropping demand for soybeans.

Located in northwestern Missouri where many fields along the Mississippi River are still under water, Blake Hurst has managed to sow all of his land. But between weather conditions and trade tensions, he does not plan to make money on his farm this year.

Farmers are used to climate hazards. However, "it's been 18 months now that we are in the trade war and we do not know if it will ever improve," he regrets. "We lose a little patience."

The support of the farming community to Donald Trump remains strong in his eyes, especially when it comes to staying firm against China.

Insurances paid to farmers who could not sow and $ 28 billion in aid to farmers affected by the trade war should help in the short term to limit the damage.

However, it is a "mostly symbolic" response to the losses caused by tariffs, says Bruce Rohwer, a farmer in northwestern Iowa and president of the state's Corn Growers Association. . In the longer term, "we will have to regain the trust of our trading partners."

© 2019 AFP