NOTE: An updated look at costs of production – and the 2017 USDA data- is available here.

The USDA’s Economic Research Service recently released 2016 crop cost of production estimates. We thought it would be useful to take a look at the budgets and see how ERS thought things might change for the next crop year. Then we looked at the budgets and realized there wasn’t much to say if we were going to focus on differences from 2015. The 2016 cost of production estimates for corn, soybeans, and wheat show costs nearly the same as those forecast for 2015. To be specific the budgeted costs range from $8.48 (corn) to $5.00 per acre (wheat) higher than 2015.  (more…)