Farmers in the high plains of Western Kansas are known for growing cereal grains such as wheat and sorghum, which is sometimes called milo.
Historically, China has been the most important export market for those products. However, in retaliation for the tariffs imposed on Chinese products by the Trump administration, China has stopped buying many U.S. agricultural products, causing prices to plummet.
With the 2025 harvest grain harvest underway, Marketplace’s Amy Scott spoke with farmers Vance and Louise Ehmke about how the trade war is impacting their market. The following is an edited transcript of their conversation:
Amy Scott: I spent some time last week on your farm in Kansas. But for people who haven’t been there, can you explain what you grow and why the Chinese market is so important to you?
Vance Ehmke: Out here in the High Plains of Western Kansas, it’s a dry land area out here. We grow a lot of wheat, corn, and milo. Trade War and the tariffs is definitely paramount on our mind, and candidly, we’re getting our butts kicked — we are not winning this thing.
Scott: Yeah, and for people who aren’t familiar with milo, also known as grain sorghum, what is it used for? And why is China such a big buyer?
Vance Ehmke: Well, grain sorghum is a feed grain, just exactly like corn, you know, here they feed it to livestock. But on the export end of it, China buys about 80 to 90% of what we export. And currently, because of the trade war, they are buying absolutely none. And as a consequence, it has really hurt the grain sorghum price. And elevators are just not being able to sell any of it at all. Many of these still have the entire [2024] crop in storage, and here we’re getting ready to harvest the ‘25 crop.
Scott: Wow. And so, what happens? Go ahead, Louise.
Louise Ehmke: As far as China goes, while they use sorghum for feed grazing, also have a drink that they make where milo is used, and they like to buy [U.S.] milo for that.
Scott: That beverage, is that Baijiu? Is that what it’s called?
Louise Ehmke: Yes, that is correct.
Vance Ehmke: Well, anyway, China has read the mail, and they decided that we’re going to get the hell out of dodge, basically. And they’re now buying all the milo from our friends down in Australia, and they’re teaching the Brazilians how to grow it as well as the Africans. And so, will they ever come back to the United States? You know, that’s extremely doubtful.
Louise Ehmke: They also want a reliable partner, as does any country.
Scott: And it’s not just the trade war. USAID was also a big buyer of Kansas milo through the Food for Peace program. How has the demise of that program under the Trump administration affected you?
Louise Ehmke: Well, that was the first loss. It was the first dollar a bushel lost was when that announcement was made. I mean, it instantly went down. It just hurt us. That Food for Peace program was a great program started here in Kansas, and Eisenhower and a local farmer suggested it, and here we are, so that’s been a devastating market loss.
Vance Ehmke: Well, annually, USAID spent $2 billion a year buying up surplus commodities and exporting them to countries in need, but it also helps support our price. Anyway, that segment of the market is also gone, just exactly like the Chinese market is gone. So again, we’re being hurt by that loss.
Scott: So, driving across Kansas last week, I saw just acres and acres and acres of milo and corn and soybeans further east getting ready for harvest. You mentioned all these grain elevators that still haven’t sold last year’s crop. So where are they going to put all this stuff when it gets harvested?
Louise Ehmke: Well, they create flatbeds on the side of the highway or near the elevator. You might weigh [crops] at the main elevator, and then they’re going to send you out to “the pile” as it’s called.
Vance Ehmke: And now, these piles are kind of, in a large part, just out in the open, on ground and subject to the weather, like rain and snow. I remember a couple of years ago, in the pile, they had two and a half million bushels of grain sorghum stored out there, and that happened to be a year in which we got a lot of rain, and when they were picking that thing up, there were about 30,000 bushels of just rotten grain.
Scott: Well, I know you make a lot of your living as a seed dealer, but you know, are you starting to feel this in the bottom line? And how about your neighbors?
Vance Ehmke: Yeah, absolutely. You know, with the real low wheat price that we’ve got, which is just a little bit about $4 a bushel, and that would have been a great price back in 1980. Here we are you know, 40 years later. Everybody suffers because of this.
Louise Ehmke: You know, farmers just cut back on everything. I mean, they won’t buy machinery. They might not till as much as they should, maybe. I mean, that’s the only thing you can try to control, is that what [investment] you’re putting into it.
Scott: Well, President Trump is scheduled to speak with Chinese President Xi on Friday. What, if anything, are you hoping could come from the call and from the larger negotiations going on this week?
Louise Ehmke: Well, let’s be friends? Hey, I’m sorry. Do you need some of that milo? You need some of those soybeans? You know, we need China as a customer.
Vance Ehmke: You know, at this point, I don’t know what can be done to salvage the relationship. You know, even if this thing were over today, it would be one or two years before we could get back on track. You know, the Trump people say that, ‘trust us, we know that you farmers going to have some tough times here for a year or two, but, you know, down the road, it’s kind of we’re going to enter this glorious age of agriculture and profitability.’ The way I’m looking at things, one or two years from now, we’re going to be at the bottom — bankruptcies are continuing. I mean, the outlook is just flat grim, and I have a great deal of trouble believing that there is something glorious out there, because the people who win the trade wars not the United States or China, it’s going to be countries like Brazil, Australia, some of the African countries, who are going to pick up all that trade that we just dropped.
Vance and Louise Ehmke will appear in an upcoming season of the “Marketplace” podcast “How We Survive,” about the future of food on a hotter planet.