Three Crises. One Growing Season. No Good Options.

American farmers planted this spring already bleeding. Tariffs jacked up their input costs. Labor is short. Now a war and a drought showed up at the same time.

Regular people will pay for it at the checkout line.

The Fertilizer Chokepoint Nobody Was Talking About

About one-third of the world's fertilizer supply passes through the Strait of Hormuz, according to PBS News. The ongoing conflict with Iran has effectively closed that strait. That's a direct hit to American agriculture during the single most critical period of the year: spring planting.

Russell Boening, a farmer south of San Antonio, Texas, told PBS News that nitrogen is running 40% higher than it was two or three months ago, before the conflict started.

Iowa farmer Lance Lillibridge told PBS he locked in most of his fertilizer before the conflict — but skipped some because it was already too expensive. Now he's going without that nutrient entirely. He says a lot of other farmers are making the same call.

Skipping fertilizer doesn't mean the same crop at lower cost. It means lower yields. Fewer bushels per acre. Less food.

Agriculture Secretary Rollins Says 80% Are Fine. Farmers Disagree.

Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told PBS News on April 6 that roughly 80% of farmers locked in their fertilizer last fall, so only 20-25% are fully exposed to the price spike. She said the administration is working to get those farmers what they need without bankrupting them.

The farmers on the ground aren't buying it.

Sledge Taylor, 73, has farmed about 4,000 acres of corn near Como, Mississippi for 53 years — the same fields his father and grandfather worked. He told NPR's Drew Hawkins that he may skip nitrogen fertilizer entirely this year, not just because of the price spike but because corn prices are simultaneously low. High costs, low revenue. The margin is gone.

Michigan farmer Matt Frostic runs a crop and livestock operation and was already feeling the squeeze before the war started, according to PBS News.

The pattern is clear: farmers who hedged are hurting. Farmers who didn't hedge are in serious trouble.

The Drought That Arrived Three Months Early

War and tariffs alone would be a tough year. Then the weather turned.

61% of the continental United States is currently under moderate to exceptional drought conditions, according to NOAA data cited by Fortune. That includes 97% of the Southeast and two-thirds of the western U.S.

What makes this drought different, according to Cornell resource economist Ariel Ortiz-Bobea, is timing. Farmers expect heat and dryness in summer. They don't expect it in March and April, when crops are being established and root systems are forming. March 2026 was the warmest March on record, according to Fortune.

David Ortega, agricultural economist at Michigan State University, told Fortune: "What's unique about the current moment is that you have this convergence of multiple factors."

Each crisis alone is manageable. All three simultaneously is a different category of problem.

What Mainstream Coverage Is Getting Wrong

Most coverage — from NPR, PBS, and Fortune — correctly identifies all three factors. But the reporting varies by outlet:

The tariff piece is getting carried differently depending on who's reporting it. Left-leaning outlets are leading with tariffs as the primary villain. But the war in the Middle East — a factor entirely outside Trump's tariff policy — is arguably the most acute, immediate crisis for this planting season. Conflating the two lets everyone avoid the harder question: what's the U.S. government's actual plan if the Strait of Hormuz stays closed through summer?

Rollins said "everything is on the table" to fix the fertilizer problem, but offered no specifics on implementation or timeline.

Conservative outlets downplaying the tariff angle are also doing farmers a disservice. Tariffs did raise input costs before the war started. That's documented. Ignoring that part of the equation distorts the full picture.

The drought is the underreported story. Weather doesn't have a political villain, so it's getting less attention than it deserves. A 61% drought coverage rate across U.S. agricultural land during spring planting is a crisis on its own. Combine it with fertilizer prices up 40% and food prices will rise — the math is straightforward.

What This Means for You

If you buy food — and you do — expect prices to rise through the second half of 2026. Crops planted with less fertilizer, in drought conditions, produce smaller yields. Smaller yields mean less supply. Less supply means higher prices.

The Mississippi Delta alone contributes to $9.5 billion in estimated agricultural production, according to NPR. It's one of the most fertile farming regions in the country. Sledge Taylor skipping nitrogen fertilizer on 4,000 acres isn't a footnote — it's a preview of what's coming for corn supply.

Farmers are being squeezed from every direction at once: input costs up, commodity prices down, water scarce, international buyers spooked by tariff uncertainty. Many are multi-generational operations with no margin left to absorb another hit.

The administration needs a concrete fertilizer contingency plan. Congress needs to ask whether the current trade and foreign policy framework is compatible with feeding the country.

Because farmers can't skip another input next year.