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Midwest

Top Ethanol Producer Files For Bankruptcy

Posted on November 7, 2008 by Eric OKeefe

One of the leading stories of 2008 has been skyrocketing commodity prices and the corresponding surge in land values throughout the Midwest, Great Plains, Southwest, and other mineral-rich areas of the country. Although the bubble has by no means burst, there…

Tagged with: Alternative energy, biofuels, corn, Farming, Midwest, VeraSun
Posted in Energy, Eric OKeefe, Farming, Feature, Midwest, News Desk, Regional News, Topics

CAT Makes It 300 in a Row

Posted on October 21, 2008 by Eric OKeefe

In the midst of a mounting avalanche of bad economic news, I thought it worth singling out one company with strong ties to the land that continues to shine. Earlier this month, Caterpillar announced that it was paying a quarterly dividend…

Tagged with: CAT, Caterpillar
Posted in Equities, Eric OKeefe, Feature, Midwest, News Desk, Regional News, Topics

“The Land Market Has Never Been Stronger”

Posted on June 27, 2008 by Eric OKeefe

So says Mac Boyd, a broker at Farmers National in Arcola, Illinois. Boyd is just one of the many veteran real estate professionals who are closely monitoring the strongest farmland market in decades.

Tagged with: commodity prices, corn, Eric O'Keefe, ethanol, farmland, soybeans
Posted in Eric OKeefe, Feature, Great Plains, Midwest, News Desk, West

High Price of Corn Means Less Land for CRP

Posted on May 6, 2008 by Land Report Editors

Driving today I tuned into C-SPAN Radio on my XM dial looking for something better than the latest Top 20. I caught the tail end of a conversation, Congressional testimony it sounded like, regarding the current food crisis that is…

Tagged with: corn prices, CRP, ethanol, food crisis, public policy
Posted in Conservation, Energy, Farming, Feature, Midwest

Corn Profits Sky High

Posted on April 27, 2008 by Land Report Editors

Corn revenues could easily surpass $40 billion in the United States this year as farmers rush to take advantage of rising interest in ethanol, according to a recent report issued by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Tagged with: corn, corn ethanol, corn prices, farm policy, USDA
Posted in Agriculture, Federal Policy, Great Lakes, Great Plains, Midwest, South, Southwest, West

Rising Land Values in Illinois

Posted on April 27, 2008 by Land Report Editors

Farmland values in Illinois increased by nearly 6 percent during the first half of this year with investors, both local and national, bidding up the rural properties, particularly in the “collar counties” around Chicago. Rather than focus on short-term problems in…

Tagged with: 1031 exchange, Chicago, Illinois, Jason Hartman, Platinum Properties Investor Network
Posted in Midwest, Regional News

The Clean Energy Scam

Posted on April 8, 2008 by Eric OKeefe

Amazing new diets, intriguing self-help books, a daily dose of St. John’s Wort – we are a country obsessed with quick fixes. Now, as Time points out in this cover story titled The Clean Energy Myth, we can add ethanol…

Corn Drives Land Prices Higher and Higher

Posted on October 1, 2007 by Eric OKeefe

It’s official. The New York Times proclaimed in August that the market for Midwestern farmland was “hot,” a declaration akin to labeling Hurricane Katrina “dangerous” two weeks after it devastated the Gulf Coast. Anyone remotely familiar with the Corn Belt…

End of the Conservation Reserve Program?

Posted on April 1, 2007 by Land Report Editors

BY JOSEPH GUINTO PUBLISHED APRIL 2007 With the Bush administration backing off on the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), conservation and hunting groups fear the 22-year-old program once dubbed “Noah’s Arc for Wildlife” is a sinking ship. Backers of the CRP,…