In a recent interview on the Fox Business Channel, investor Jim Rogers suggests the best industry of our time may be agriculture. He warns he is not a great market timer, but he says rice and sugar are commodities to keep an eye on.
He goes on to say the next 20 years will be great for farmers, lumberjacks and others.
“Agriculture will be one of the great industries of our time.”
Land value is up 20% in the midwest in the first quarter of 2011 primarily due to a sharp spike in grain prices. Many experts believe we are not experiencing a farmland bubble right now, but prices could be tempered if the federal reserve tightens monetary policy over the next few months. Others believe prices will not go down, and will go up further still.
During the first three months of the year, Nebraska and Kansas saw the largest jump in values, with nonirrigated land values up 24% from a year ago, according to the quarterly report from the Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank.
All other areas covered in the report including Oklahoma, Colorado, Wyoming and parts of New Mexico and Missouri saw increases in the quarter.
Read the entire story on farmland value from the Wall Street Journal.
Very interesting comments on land sale trends from Erick O’Keefe, editor from the Land Report, presented by Hall and Hall.
Nebraska land value is at an all-time high, averaging $1,833/acre for the entire state, but averaging $4,625/acre in certain parts of the state. A new report by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln says these higher values represent a 22% increase over last year, and land values have doubled since 2005.
Rental rates are soaring along with value. You can read the entire story from Business Week here.
Warren Buffett’s annual letter to Berkshire Hathaway’s shareholders has become a sort of state of the union address. This year Mr. Buffett expressed great confidence in the US economy, pointing out that America is still the land of opportunity, and where opportunity is, money will follow.
Last year, the company spent $5 billion buying property and equipment in the US, which represented 90% of their total property and equipment investment. Read more on this story from the New York Times here.
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