Rick Tolman Quotations

Most weren't hit very hard. A number of barges have broken loose or sunk. It's a matter of getting power back, getting barge traffic moving again so we can get to the elevator, and clearing the port.

Harvest is a time of high energy use to fuel tractors and combines and that hits right at the bottom line. Prices (of grain) are a bit low and as we have fewer exports then prices may drop some more so farmers are caught in a real price cost squeeze.

Normally we rely on a lot of it moving out down the river to export points as we bring the new crop in. In the short run they will have to build piles on the ground and hope that it doesn't rain.

About 60 percent of our corn that goes for export moves down the Mississippi river and that's shut down.

I'm hearing estimates of maybe a week to two weeks before they can resume exporting. But if it goes longer than that, our customers start turning to other sources of supply and we start losing sales, which obviously has an impact on price.