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'1"1";'!:'0 i) .~ _ '" ... ) Crop 2020 Price Estimates Used in High Plains Analysis Price/ Total Irrigated Unit* Production Acres ($/Unit) (Million (1000 Bu) Acs) RLM (mT'1$ ) Low Price Estimates Price/ Total Irrigated Unit Production Acres** ($/Unit) (Million (1000) Bu) Acs RLM (mTl$) Corn 3.09 14.7 80 2.23 2.3 18 Wheat 3.40 42.7 47 2.67 36.1 46 Sorghum 2.63 32.0 206 1.95 19.3 31 Alfalfa 74.16 296.0*** 47 53.52 64.0*** 11 Total 430 69 133 20 * State level prices determined using NIRAP projections. Prices vary between states by as much as 10 percent. ** Harvested Acres *** Thousand Tons These price changes have more of an effect on the profitability of High Plains farming than variations in productivity or energy prices. While a major variation from projected productivity would greatly effect production and commodity and consumer prices, such a Change would have a lesser effect on returns to land and management and the total value of regional production, and thus will have a smaller effect on the regional economy than these lower price increases. If prices fall low enough, they can make irrigated farming, or even dryland farming, unprofitable On the High Plains. The number of acres in production could then be effected significantly. Export demand is the most fluid and unpredictable variable in determining whether these lower prices will actually occur. The attractiveness of different water management strategies could also be affected by a shift in prices. Depressed levels of returns to land and management mean that farmer's have a smaller amount available to pay for water, and thus can pay a smaller fraction of the costs of an import scheme. If implemented, the import scheme could increase production and depress national prices and returns to land and management still further in the "low price" scenarios. A-37