Mike Lockhart and Betsy Jensen, Northland Community College farm management instructors, says their projections for what it will cost cost to grow corn, wheat and soybeans in 2008 are “shocking.”

Lockhart and Jensen, both farmers themselves, presented the information at a Big Iron marketing meeting sponsored by the Minnesota Association of wheat Growers and North Dakota Wheat Growers Association.

They project that is it going to cost $60 per acre more to grow corn, $30-35 per acre more to grow wheat and $15-$20 per acre more to grow soybeans in 2008 than in 2007.

The totals – exluding land costs – are $188.24 per acre to grow wheat, $157.85 per acre to grow soybeans and $331.39 per acre to grow corn. Add your local land rent to those numbers to get the total expense.

Lockhart and Jensen urge farmers to prepare for an extended run of higher cost, even if grain prices fall.

“We have a new plateau out there – a new cost plateau,” Jensen says