Editors' Notebook

A man on an airplane once accused me of moving the wheat market with a tweet.

I'd just finished three days on the spring wheat crop tour, scouting fields by day and consuming my share of barley by night. All I wanted to do was close my eyes and take a nap, but all he wanted to do was quiz me.

Overall, that year's spring wheat crop was expected to be large, but I had posted a picture of a field that didn't fit that billing on Twitter, which is now called X. Around the same time, the market jumped 9 cents. As a vice president at a large grain company, he was convinced I'd soured a position on his books -- an unforgivable crime.

I believe there was more behind that day's market action than my tweet, but I will always remember this encounter as an example of just how invested people -- whether they are farmers, traders, end users or consumers -- are in the crop's outcome. Real money and real livelihoods are on the line, and people can be very sensitive to information they perceive as hurtful to their position.

There's a lot of real money and red ink on the line for row-crop producers this year, regardless of the commodity. Producing top-tier yields, such as the National Wheat Yield Contest Bin Busters featured in the March Progressive Farmer issue, and this week on DTNPF.com, takes intensive management and lots of inputs, which look unaffordable in today's price environment. (See "Wheat Acre Squeeze for 2026," https://www.dtnpf.com/…)

By now, you've all heard the saying that high prices cure high prices, and low prices cure low prices, but I contend that low prices don't do this work on their own. Another lesson I learned from my dozen crop tours is that markets are made by people. Someone must build a relationship before a ship sets sail. Then expanded demand can boost prices.

It's easy to overlook this yeoman's work when commodity prices are good, but the wheat industry is a prime example of how this hard work pays off over the long term. As of the end of January, U.S. wheat exports were up 17% from last year.

The U.S. already has five buyers with orders for 1 million metric tons or more on the books, including Japan, Mexico, Nigeria, the Philippines and South Korea. Indonesia and Taiwan are very close to breaking into the club, as well, with 996,000 metric tons and 873,000 metric tons worth of sales, respectively, as of the end of January.

"We continue to have a wide base of buyers that buy year in and year out, but competitive pricing brought in quite a few nontraditional markets," said U.S. Wheat Associates communication director Julia Debes, who I met on my first wheat tour in 2011. "We're planning to leverage that opportunity to showcase the quality of U.S. wheat to build a foundation for future sales, even when prices rebound back up."

U.S. wheat continues to move through export channels despite an abundance of global supply. Price-sensitive buyers have many origins to choose from, but with six distinct classes of wheat and transparent grain-inspection standards, the U.S. makes it easy for buyers to find just the right product for their needs.

Building the demand base creates long-term benefits, and I hope this trend continues. Wheat growers need the good news, especially with a challenging year ahead.

Katie Dehlinger can be reached at katie.dehlinger@dtn.com

Follower her on social platform X @KatieD_DTN

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