The National Grain and Feed Association (NGFA) has joined with a diverse array of farm, commodity and agribusiness organizations in urging immediate action to maintain navigation on the Mississippi River between St. Louis, Missouri, and Cairo, Illinois.

Navigation on this 200-mile stretch of the Mississippi River “will be severely impaired -- and barge transportation may well cease altogether -- by mid-December unless the administration takes emergency action to ensure the statutorily authorized nine-foot draft needed to maintain commercial navigation,” according to a letter submitted to President Barack Obama and other key federal officials and members of Congress by the NGFA and 20 other agricultural and waterway organizations.

Specifically, the letter urges that action be taken under Section 501(b) of the Stafford Act directing that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers:

The Mississippi River is essential to U.S. agriculture -- serving as the primary means of transporting key agricultural inputs and providing access to domestic and international markets for U.S. farmers’ production. The letter stressed that maintaining navigation for the next few months is “particularly critical” for securing crop inputs for the 2013 planting season and marketing the 2012 grain and oilseed crop. In an average weather year, nearly 60 percent of U.S. grain and oilseed exports are transported via the Mississippi River system.

While, drought-reduced yields plagued much of the U.S. growing region this year, the USDA reports that more than 65 million metric tons of grains and nearly 37 million metric tons of soybeans are likely to be exported. In total, it is projected that approximately 300 million bushels of grains and oilseeds worth $2.3 billion would be delayed in reaching their intended markets in December and January if Mississippi River navigation is disrupted. Meanwhile, it is estimated more than 500,000 tons of fertilizer moving northbound would be disrupted during the same two-month period.

“Reduced supplies in export positions would pressure farm prices and erode the United States’ ability and reputation as a reliable supplier of agricultural products to serve foreign buyers, which is integrally important to U.S. and global economic growth, domestic jobs and global food security,” the letter said.

The letter also emphasized that losing access to efficient, low-cost barge transportation would affect U.S. farmers and agribusinesses adversely through increased transportation costs. It noted that barges provide a competitive alternative that discipline rates charged by other modes, In addition, it said, it would be “neither feasible nor cost-effective” to divert the volume of affected agricultural commodities to truck and rail given capacity and routing constraints. The letter noted a single dry-bulk barge -- the type typically used in transport grains, oilseed and fertilizer -- can haul 1,750 tons of product, compared to 110 tons in a bulk rail car and 25 tons in a truck trailer.

In addition, the letter pointed out, “ the cascading impacts and costs that would be felt by American consumers and our fellow citizens as a result of impacts on other industrial products -- such as coal, imported fuel, road salt and other goods.”