Episode 6: Agriculture Trends You Should Know About with Dr. David Kohl
There’s one constant in agriculture. And that’s that things are constantly changing.
“Farming today is a lot like basketball,” says Dr. David Kohl, professor emeritus at Virginia Tech. “95 percent of the time the ball's not in your hands.”
As a seasoned agriculturalist, traveler and researcher, Dr. David Kohl has the unique wisdom and perspective of observing agriculture trends. In this episode of AgCredit Said It, our hosts interview Kohl to get his candid insight about the trends we’ll likely see in 2022 and into the future.
Here are the top four insights on agriculture trends:
- Fertilizer prices
A huge topic of conversation among farmers is high fertilizer prices. And the one question they’re all asking is: what’s affecting it? Kohl explains that one reason for the fertilizer price increase stems from major-producing fertilizer countries like China and Russia retaining their fertilizer products at home. As a result, farmers are taking a hard look at their crop plans for next year and making strategic changes to combat heightened prices.
Kohl’s own farm and livestock operation, which is primarily dairy, beef and hay, is taking on a new venture to replace fertilizer costs: chickens. They’re hoping that the poultry litter produced through raising chickens will substitute not only the cost of their inputs but also allow them to incorporate organic matter into their field’s soil health.
“We’re looking at going to poultry later this year because this [high fertilizer prices] may be here for an extended period of time,” says Kohl. “We’ve found that poultry litter right now is about the cost of what we paid for fertilizer last year.” - Government payments
Over the past few years, government payments have played a large part in helping increase farm net income. To give context, Kohl explains that according to the Farm Financial Database (FINBIN), “on grain farms, 62 percent of net farming income was a government check. On dairy farms, it was 72 percent. Hog farms, 127 percent. Beef farms, 108 percent.”
As we look to the future, Kohl relays that it will be important for farmers to have a plan for post-government support, specifically looking at recurring versus non-reoccurring government payments on their year-end financials.
For example, conservation program monies are considered a reoccurring government payment. Kohl expects these programs to stick around, though they will most likely have a “green element” as environmental conservation picks up steam. But money, like that provided by the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP), is considered a non-reoccurring payment, and these programs won’t stay. - Farmers (should) wear many hats
“There are so many different hats that a farmer has to wear, “ says Matt Adams, AgCredit Said It host and account officer. “From agronomist to chemist, to banking and government regulations. I mean, you name it. We have to know a little bit about everything.”
Today, farmers are realizing the importance of record-keeping, financial planning, and people management.
“It’s so exciting to see this new energy coming into agriculture,” agrees Kohl. “What we call ‘Business IQ’ is going to be extremely important.” - Transition plans
After surveying a group of young farmers about what keeps them up at night, Kohl found that transition plans were the number one reason young producers couldn’t sleep at night, among inflating costs, higher interest rates, and trying to explain operations to a spouse or partner.
“Don’t hold the younger generation hostage, “ says Kohl. “The transition plan may be a process, but it’s one that can be tweaked along the way.”
Here’s a glance at this episode:
- [07:44] It’s important to monitor what is happening within the global agriculture industry and plan for how global markets may affect your specific operation.
- [09:49] When analyzing your year-end financials, take a look at recurring and non-reoccuring government payments and determine how dependent you are on those payments.
- [14:28] Record keeping is critical to an operation’s success.
- [18:55] 80% of a business plan is developing a projected cash flow.
- [19:37] Review your financials monthly or quarterly so that you can tweak your plans depending on conditions.
- [21:57] Outline your vision and goals for the next year. Any decisions you make should align with not only your operational goals, but also your family and personal goals.
- [25:07] Begin the transition plan process, knowing that things can be tweaked along the way.
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Bios
Guest Dr. David M. Kohl, Ph.D.
Dr. David Kohl is an academic Hall of Famer in the College of Agriculture at Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, VA. Dr. Kohl has keen insight into the agriculture industry gained through extensive travel, research, and involvement in ag businesses. He has traveled nearly 10 million miles; conducted more than 6,500 presentations; and published more than 2,250 articles in his career. Dr. Kohl’s wisdom and engagement with all levels of the industry provide a unique perspective into future trends.
Host Matt Adams
Matt serves Paulding County as an account officer at AgCredit. He has worked in ag lending for over three years and previously worked in farm equipment sales for 11 years. He and his wife farm in northwest Ohio with their two daughters and son. His favorite part about AgCredit is the people. From the member-borrowers to the internal team at AgCredit, every day keeps getting better. Matt hopes to bring insights to ag lending and some laughs to the AgCredit Said It podcast.
Host Libby Wixtead
Libby has been an account officer for seven years serving AgCredit members in Marion County. She grew up on a 200-acre grain farm and was very active in 4-H and FFA. Today, Libby and her husband operate a 2,400-head swine finishing barn. Her favorite thing about working at AgCredit is working with local farmers from the same area where she grew up and seeing their operations thrive. She loves working in agriculture and helping her customers be successful year after year.
Transcription
Speaker 1 (00:02):Welcome to AgCredit Said It. The podcast for farm newbies and seasoned professionals alike. In each episode, our hosts sit down with experts from across the agriculture industry to bring you insights, advice, and must-have information on all things rural living. From farming to finances and everything in between. So, let's get to it.
Libby Wixtead (00:26):Welcome back to AgCredit Said It. It's Matt and Libby here today with an exciting interview for the end of the year. Hard to believe it's almost 2022 already. And Matt, I am so excited for our interview today with Dr. Kohl.
Matt Adams (00:40):I am, too. This is one I've really been looking forward to. I think there's going to be a lot of good information here to put out on this. Today, we have with us Dr. David Kohl, Professor Emeritus at Virginia Tech. Dr. Kohl is an academic Hall of Famer in the College of Agriculture at Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. He has a keen insight into the agriculture industry, gained through extensive travel, research, and involvement in ag businesses. He has traveled nearly 10 million miles, conducted more than 6,500 presentations, and published more than 2,250 articles in his career. Dr. Kohl's wisdom and engagement with all levels of the industry provide a unique perspective in the future trends.
Matt Adams (01:22):Welcome back. Here with Matt and Libby, and we want to welcome Dr. Kohl with us today. Dr. Kohl, I know you've been doing a lot of traveling here lately, kind of seeing some different areas. Probably a lot of different land value changes through the grain belt. What’s harvest look like? It's wrapping up for most of the area out there, is it?
Dr. David Kohl (01:45):Yeah, it's real interesting. I was in Billings, Montana, of course, out there, they're more the wheat and livestock markets. Believe it or not, out there, the land values are not hot. I think they had year over year, about four percent increase. Going into Northwest Iowa and in Nebraska, I would say about 90 percent of the harvest is done. What's real interesting there, I can tell land values just are hot and the ag economy is hot there. By just looking out the windshield, I see a lot of land clearing going on.
Dr. David Kohl (02:21):Anytime you see a lot of land clearing going on, you know you've got a hot economy. But it's real interesting, they're paying anywhere from $20,000 to $30,000 an acre for farm ground and they had some that was marginal last week that sold for about $18,000 an acre. And it's real interesting, it's not outside investors, it's basically, people that are 60 years and older just acquired more land out there for their children to farm.
Libby Wixtead (02:58):Yeah, that makes it tough for the young farmers to come in, but to have that family support really helps them out. I know that harvest is wrapping up here in Ohio. In my conversations with my farmers here, in planning for 2022, one of their biggest questions is, what's going on with fertilizer prices? And is it the supply chain that's affecting it, or what is affecting that fertilizer price increase?
Dr. David Kohl (03:24):It's interesting out there, Libby. That's the trillion dollar question. I was on Zoomcast to Saskatchewan, same question. I think when you look at the fertilizer, there's a couple elements going on. Number one, China produces about 30 percent of our fertilizer. And of course, they're keeping it at home or they're sending it to Brazil because through their Silk and Belt Road Initiative, they've built a lot of infrastructure in that region of the world. The other element, Libby, that's real interesting, Russia produces the elements there and also they're kind of flexing their muscle as well.
Dr. David Kohl (04:08):But beyond supply chains, I think one of the things, I know we have our agriculture operation which is dairy, beef, and hay, we're looking at going to poultry later this year because this may be in here for a little extended period of time. And I'm not being politically correct on this. We got out in front of our skis going to the green movement. And what we've done is we've disinvested in fossil fuels. Companies like Exxon, they've kind of shut it down. And whether it's the pipelines or fracking or all those elements, you have to keep in mind that 8 out of every $10 a farmer or a rancher spends, is somehow connected to energy. And of course, fertilizer, chemicals and all those cropping costs are related to those energy situations. You could really feel this coming. We had a period of low energy cost because we, the United States of America, we were the number one producer of energy in the world and our neighbors to the north, Canada was fourth, and Mexico eighth, but what's happened in the past 12 months we're unraveling that.
Dr. David Kohl (05:23):And so, as I told the producers up in the prairie provinces of Canada, you have got to look at every one of your fields. You've got to be doing the soil testing. We're thinking about dropping about 30 percent of our acreage. It's kind of marginal land. It also doesn't quite fit our operation and so I think, line by line management is going to be really critical but again, it's more than supply chains, it's the whole energy complex.
Libby Wixtead (05:55):So you think that a lot of farmers are going to have to be really looking at each of their fields and really looking at maintaining the land, not really adding more, or building more in the soil. And then I know we've had a lot of customers actually, that have been switching to chicken litter because we have a local place that produces it so that has been a switch that we've seen here locally.
Dr. David Kohl (06:16):Well, Libby, one of the things that we were discussing, my son and I, is that we wanted to build up the organic matter of the soil. And we said, "This is a great opportunity to be able to do that." Now, one of the things that we've got to do is, we're going to go around notify all the neighbors because they haven't had that smell in that area. And so, it's going to take a little bit of neighbor relations, but again, some of our neighbors, we're near Blacksburg, home of Virginia Tech. This farm would be about 12 miles outside. These folks are kind of environmentally conscious, and so what we're trying to do, we'll position it that we're building up the organic matter which we needed to do on these farms anyhow, and it's a great opportunity. And one of the things that we found is, the poultry litter right now, we've already locked in on it, is about the cost of what we paid for fertilizer last year. And so, it's not saying that we're going to go totally away from it but we're definitely making that strategic move this year.
Matt Adams (07:24):At least control the costs a little bit on that aspect. I kind of wonder what's on a lot of producers' minds too, even me personally, at home on our farm, when we look at these challenges. Am I going to change my crop plan up for next year? Am I going to plant as many acres of corn versus soybeans?
Dr. David Kohl (07:44):That was interesting. When I was up there in Northwest Iowa, I was actually in a place called Spencer, Iowa and it's just south of the Minnesota border. Many of those producers and the lunch conversation were saying, "Well, maybe I'm going to move a little bit more to beans, and we're looking at other enterprises." But what some of them said, "We've got to kind of keep an eye on what's going on in South America right now because you see, they're in their spring and summer season and so, a lot of our prices up here in the Northern hemisphere may be dictated to what happens down the Southern hemisphere." So what you got to do, you kind of got to think globally and watch what's going on globally and then bring it down to your specific operation. And then the other element, you got to think through the production, the marketing and risk. We're going to have a market for it. And so there's quite a few complexities in there that it's going to really require astute planning.
Matt Adams (08:46):Definitely. I think one of the other things we kind of look at too, we look at the income that we've had on a farm operation over the last couple years. Government payments have definitely played a part in helping our farm net income. This year, our crop, we've had record yields at very good prices, which has kind of helped ease some of the stress there. What's your thoughts on future government payments, and can they be sustained if a downtrend hits the ag commodities again?
Dr. David Kohl (09:22):Well, Matt, I want you to think about steroids. And what I'm trying to say is, it's like an athlete on steroids. Their heads get bigger, their arms get bigger, but it's false. And I got to be really candid with you. These government payments come with no cost to production. And that really hit a lender the other day. He said, "I never thought about that." In other words, the checks were written out, there's no cost to production.
Dr. David Kohl (09:49):And I was looking at the FINBIN data the other day, and that's 3,500 farms over 22 states. And it was interesting. On grain farms, I want everybody to listen to this, 62 percent of the net farming income was a government check. On dairy farms, it was 72 percent. Hog farms, 127 percent. Beef farms, 108 percent. So in that context, I think as we look at 2022 and 2023, what's going to be our plan post-government support? We're still going to farm. And so, what you got to do, when you're sitting down and analyzing your year ends, or your year end trends from 2016 on, you got to look at that line called government payments. The question you've got to ask is, is it reoccurring or non-reoccurring? For example, conservation program, that'll be a reoccurring government payment, but then the PPP money and different money, that's not going to be around. So what's going to be our plan post-government payments, reoccurring and non-reoccurring?
Dr. David Kohl (11:02):Another trend that I see picking up steam in '23, '24, and '25. More of our government payments are going to be green payments. In other words, what are we doing for environment conservation, et cetera, et cetera, because some monies have been put in that place. So to answer the question, we're still going to have government payments around but we'll see a shift toward the green element. But the other element is, we really got to look at that bottom line and just say, how dependent are we on those government payments?
Dr. David Kohl (11:41):And what scares me is, some people made some long-term investments out there in machinery and equipment or land. Those debt service payments are still going to come about for a five or a seven or a 10 year period, and can you still make those debt payments, I call it overhead cost payments, without the government spigot there? Because again, what you're going to find is, think about this, two billion dollar a day was going for government payments worldwide in agriculture and that's not sustainable. It'll basically break the government. So, life after government payments is probably one of the things, strategically, we have to think about. We have the dairy creamery, we have the farms here, but then I think everyone's going to have to think about it. And that's going to really require looking at those financials, line by line management.
Matt Adams (12:44):And I think even here locally in our area, here in Northwest Ohio, our state has put out the H2Ohio program, which is basically, repaying producers for pretty much the practices that we were doing already. So, we have that and one big push, the area... I farm at in Paulding County, Ohio, a very heavy agriculture, a very rural community. We've had a lot of the wind energy, solar energy farms coming in. That's been a big part that guys are able to lease that ground and make a pretty substantial income from leasing out to these wind and solar farms. I wonder if that's a trend that's going to continue to grow. And there again, I know a lot of it is government subsidy back to help finance these projects.
Dr. David Kohl (13:40):It's real interesting. I flew into Omaha, it's a three and a half hour drive up to Spencer. And I reflected, I'd been doing a similar trip 40 years ago. And what did I see out there on the landscape? Fewer farmstead lights. In other words, fewer farmsteads, but what did I see? The big wind towers up there and it was just amazing how that has kind of come in. And we're definitely seeing that, whether I'm in Ohio, which occasionally, I'll drive from Central Indiana down through your area or whether I'm out in Iowa, we're definitely seeing that infrastructure definitely taking place nationwide.
Dr. David Kohl (14:28):And again, we do have some outside investors coming in betting that the green energy's going to pick up steam. So, we're starting to feel some of that pressure of what we'd call the nontraditional investor coming in targeting that as well. But one of the things that, as we go toward this green movement and your government payments that are associated with it. What one thing's going to be really critical? Record keeping, transparency. I know it's one of those things I kind of cringe at but Alicia's really good at record keeping here in the office, my wife is at home. But one of the things, having that transparency is going to be very, very critical moving forward. So, we're going to have to step the game plan up on record keeping and transparency.
Matt Adams (15:24):I think that's one thing we look at as farmers. So many people think of us, we just go out and play in the dirt for 12 hours a day. There's so many different hats that a farmer has to wear, from agronomist to chemist to banking, government regulations. I mean, you name it. We have to know a little bit about everything.
Dr. David Kohl (15:49):Matt, and right along with that., that's what's exciting about my new generation of farmers and ranchers. And I do a public what about 20 multiple day programs around the country and it's so exciting seeing this new energy coming into agriculture. And they realize the importance of working on the books or working on the finances. And they fully realize people management and that what we call ‘Business IQ’ is going to be extremely, extremely important out there so that's something I see very, very positive.
Libby Wixtead (16:27):Yes, it is exciting. Those are the customers that I love to work with, the ones that are business minded. It's very exciting to work with them and bring on the new technology pieces to their operations. From everything that we've talked about, it sounds like it comes down to the management piece and how they're making management decisions this year. And I know you always say, "Sweat the small things." So what small things should our farmers be sweating in the next year?
Dr. David Kohl (16:57):It's funny. Libby, you're a good listener. You've heard that too many times out there. But all jokes aside, I was in Ames, Iowa a few years ago, and I was a moderator of a panel and there happened to be a lady. She earned her master degree at Iowa State in Animal Science and Agronomy. And she says, "You know what's real interesting? Ninety-five percent of what I do is actually working with the agriculture producers on their financials." And she said, "I would've never envisioned that." And I said, "Well, what makes the difference between, I'd say the average, below average, and the above average?" She says, "It's very simple. They sweat the small stuff." And so that's where I get that quote, "Sweat the small stuff." You know what? And it's analogous.
Dr. David Kohl (17:47):You know what Libby? You worked with the Ohio State Basketball team and I coached basketball. And one of the things is, farming today is a lot like basketball, 95 percent of the time the ball's not in your hands. It's what you do away from the ball. And you see, the sweating the small stuff is kind of like doing those things that, oh, they don't show it on ESPN, the dunk or whatever, but it's all those little things that are important. Can I give you one of those little things?
Dr. David Kohl (18:21):For this year, one of the things that's going to be critical is developing a cash flow. I almost tore my hair out the other day in Montana. You want a lender out there and didn't work for farm credit. I asked a banker he said, "Well, I do my cash flows for my customers." And he says, "I just can't get them to do cash flows." And all of a sudden, he goes, "Well, you teach all that and everything, but I just can't get them to do it." Well, the rest of the bankers said, "Well, we're getting more and more of our customers doing cash flow." So it kind of shut him up.
Dr. David Kohl (18:55):But doing the cashflow, can I tell you why that's important? It's 80 percent of a business plan. Because you got to think about your production plan, which we talked about, your marketing, your risk management, your operations, and your finance. And so a lot of people throw their hands up, "Well, I can't do projected cash flow. I don't know what production's going to be or prices or cost." Well, that's where you get the spreadsheet out and if you don't know how to do spreadsheets, get somebody younger around you. And by the way, all of your children and grandchildren in school, if the school does not teach spreadsheets, fire them.
Libby Wixtead (19:34):Yes.
Dr. David Kohl (19:37):Because spreadsheets are very, very critical. And what we've got to do on those spreadsheets is expand our guardrails because cost like fertilizer, and some of those costs could be up 20, 30 percent. And then the prices are going to be all over the board and so what we've got to do, that thing called financial sensitivity analysis, is going to be real critical. And then I got to tell you another thing that's real critical and sweat the small stuff. You cannot, and I'll emphasize this, look at your financials once a year. Drive-by financials don't cut it. What's happening is, you're going to have to look at them monthly or quarterly, because what you're going to have to do is kind of tweak your plan. It's kind of like you go into the basketball game and football game you got your plays set, but what you're going to have to do is kind of adjust it as game conditions change.
Dr. David Kohl (20:33):And so I know people roll their eyes about doing a projected cash flow, but that's what we're doing at the creamery. And actually, we're watching our cash flows weekly at the creamery right now. We're in the eggnog and custard season right now. And boy, we've got some targets. We've got to sell X amount every week to make our coverage ratio at the end of the year. And you see how you link your sales and your production rate to your coverage ratio which you folks, that's one of the ratios that you really look at. So I've rambled on there, but I get excited about that. And doing those projected cashflow is very, very critical. And by the way, this is how a young farmer and rancher, I say rancher, because I do a lot of stuff in the Western part of the United States, that's where you can gain the competitive advantage over the land equity type of older farmer.
Matt Adams (21:34):That's a great point, Dr. Kohl. And that brings kind of the thoughts I had, and we talked about our young producers. We call our AgStart guys on the AgCredit side. Do you think going forward in these next 12 months, is this a good time for our young producers to look to expand, to gain that competitive edge or sit back, service some debt, stay conservative and ride the storm?
Dr. David Kohl (21:57):I tell you, I get asked that, and a lot of young farmers, "Should I buy this land or whatever? First of all, you've got to test your changes that you're going to make to your vision and goals that you've outlined. This is why, right after the first year, over the holidays here, is to establish your goals. Short term under one year, longer term three to five years. And any decision you make, is it consistent with your goals, your family goals, or your personal goals? It's called the sniff test. And for some folks, by purchasing some land or purchasing equipment or adding additional acres might have to take on a considerable amount of debt. The second sniff test is, if you can't sleep at night, it's probably against your internal compass. Or a spouse or a partner can't sleep at night, it might be... In other words, you got to run it to buy. And so I hate to give a lawyer answer, "It depends." But that goal setting really kind of helps you.
Dr. David Kohl (23:07):The other element is that, we're probably going to be moving into a period, I don't mean to be a gloom and doom on this, we're probably going to be going into a phase one downturn. In other words, margins are going to be kind of crunched and different things like this. So, people are probably going to be tapping the brakes and probably not quite as aggressive as they have been, and so finding that opportunity. By the way, what I like about young farmers, they're into everything, digging. No, they are. And it's exciting. They might be a welder on the side, then shortage of truckers right now, they might be doing that. I teach ag. They might be a basketball coach or a lender. And so what they do is they're able to put this cash flow together to be able to service debt that normally wouldn't have been able to be serviced if it was just a traditional corn or beans or hogs, you follow where I'm coming from. And so, putting that plan together.
Dr. David Kohl (24:14):We had over here in Maryland, a young couple. He's a welder, she teaches ag, and they are buying their third farm now. They've paid for two of them that way. And they said, "We're able to expand our operation because we're able to multiply our leverage, that gig income." We call it gig income. Do you know what the other thing that this couple was doing? As much as we talk about farm budgeting, they had their personal finances down. In other words, she was on Quicken and she knew exactly how much family living withdrawal and they were a little bit conservative. And as they said, "Every dollar you save on family living is like a $1.40 because that's usually after taxes." And so again, it's that little small stuff.
Dr. David Kohl (25:07):So I didn't answer your question, but you run by your goals. Can you sleep at night? And then is it consistent with where you want to be three years or five years on out there? Can I just tell you one thing? We asked a group of young farmers what keeps them up at night and I surveyed them this summer. And it was these inflating costs, possibly higher interest rates, and trying to explain the operation to a spouse or partner that didn't grow up on a farm. But you know what their number one was? Mom and dad won't tell us what's in the transition plan. They're buying all this land but they won't tell us what's in the transition or the estate plan. And I want to get that message out there on the podcast, hopefully, some of the older generation is listening to it. That is going to require a lot of emphasis with the possible changes and the tax loss but don't hold the younger generation hostage.
Libby Wixtead (26:13):Yeah. I would say Dr. Kohl that is a very big piece that's happening with the farmers that we see. And the younger generation is trying to plan ahead of, "Okay. How are we going to buy machinery? Is the older generation buying it or are we buying it?" And it seems like the older generation is dragging their feet a little bit because they don't want to deal with it and they just don't want to think about it. And I know that has been, I would say, I don't know about you Matt, but that has been a struggle for some of my personal customers on the transition piece. And I've even got on my family like we have to get this done. We got to figure this out.
Matt Adams (26:50):Well, and I think, one thing I've seen is dealing with a lot of our members, and I don't know if it's just that. It seems like the young generation we're working with now that they're looking for that transition plan. They want to, "Hey, we want to get stuff set up. So we know where this farm's heading in the future." The generation before seems like I don't want to say necessarily got a late start in it, but took ownership later than maybe what their parents did so they're not really ready to toss the keys yet. They haven't had it for as long. It just seems to me like it's kind of getting a longer time when we transition this farm to the next operators.
Dr. David Kohl (27:27):Well, both of you are spot on, on this. And what's real interesting, we're living four times longer in our retirement years than we did 40, 50 years ago. And it doesn't mean that we're living four times longer. It's in your retirement years. And you look at it with technology we have today, producers can be active. You got your cab tractors, sometimes I'm the older generation I have to be taught what's going. But that is... You brought up a very valid point, and so that is playing right into this whole idea. But one of the big mistakes is turning the management over at the age of 50 and 60, the 90 year old or 80 year old that does that, that can result into some issues out there.
Dr. David Kohl (28:25):But now the older generation, I can empathize with them because a lot of their self-worth is in their farm. And so it's not only a financial aspect, it's the emotional aspect. And when it hits the emotional aspect, you know what happens? Communication shuts right down. And as I told the group the other day, I said, "You're probably going to spend at least a 100 to 200 hours on transition planning." And it's probably going to cost you a half to one percent of your asset base. And I says, "If you don't do that, the ultimate winner is our uncle. Uncle Sam and some high price lawyers and accountants." So I did a whole series on this just before Thanksgiving, two nights before Thanksgiving, I'm sure I destroyed a lot of Thanksgiving dinners. It was called Turkey Talk on Transition in Tennessee. Good old rocky top. But I really laid out how do you get the process going? How do you continue it? How do you bring it to the finish line? It's a process. There's no doubt about that.
Libby Wixtead (29:38):And I think it's a continuing process too. I mean, once you have a plan in place, things always change so it's something that you continually look at and work on as the years goes on as well.
Dr. David Kohl (29:48):Libby, you worked with the basketball team over at The Ohio State University. You think about a coach, while thinking about what's going on today with all the potholes and everything. Transition management is probably one of the top issues that're facing coaches today. And so transition planning is just not only to a farm or a small business out here, it's to your organization, it's to our organization. And so you have to make some time for that. It is a process and just like doing a cash flow occasionally, you got to come back and look at it and you got to tweak it because conditions will change.
Libby Wixtead (30:35):Well, sounds like we have a lot of management items to look at. And we thank you, Dr. Kohl for coming on the podcast today, we've very enjoyed having you.
Matt Adams (30:45):It's been a privilege.
Dr. David Kohl (30:48):But, hey, it's been a pleasure and I always enjoy working with you all.
Libby Wixtead (30:51):Thank you.
Matt Adams (30:52):Thank you.
Dr. David Kohl (30:53):Thank you.
Matt Adams (30:55):Thanks for joining us today. We look forward to bringing you more new episodes starting January 3rd, 2022. From all of us here at AgCredit Said It, we want to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a happy new year.
Speaker 1 (31:06):Thank you for listening to AgCredit Said It. Want to talk ag in between episodes, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram @agcredit. For more tips and resources visit agcredit.net, and be sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast player. Catch you next time.