See what river lock failures could cost farmers
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Many of the locks and dams in the U.S. inland waterway system are past their usable lifespan and, even worse, for years have not been maintained as they should have been, claims the United Soybean Board.
A lock failure would hurt U.S. farmers who use the waterways to ship their products and also U.S. consumers who eventually buy those products. In addition, farmers and consumers would see prices for fertilizer, fuel and coal increase.
Click here to view a map that shows what a lock failure could do to farmers that have grain shipped down the river. While looking at the map, moving the computer cursor over the lock and dam dot will provide the economic impact numbers.
The new, interactive map was recently developed by the soy checkoff to make information about this issue more accessible as well as more specific to local areas, the USB explained.
That information was compiled recently in soy-checkoff-funded research that shows the importance of the U.S. inland waterway system to U.S. soybean farmers. According to the checkoff’s most recent study, U.S. waterways make a staggering impact on U.S. farmers’ bottom lines as well as on the price U.S. consumers pay for food. The new, interactive map shows the effect a failure at each of five locks on the Ohio, Mississippi and Illinois rivers would have on U.S. soybean and corn prices.
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