Hot, dry summer could lead to higher food prices

(Harrisburg) — More than half of Pennsylvania’s counties have been under a drought watch or warning this summer, and the state Department of Environmental Protection just recently placed 4 others under a watch.

That has an impact on crops, and may carry over into your grocery store bill.

Farmers in some counties have been battling to keep their crops hydrated through the unusually warm and dry summer.

The biggest impact has been in the midstate and north, according to Mark O’Neill with the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau.

He says some dairy farmers have had to buy feed because they haven’t been able to harvest enough from their own crops.

Those low yields could drive up prices, but O’Neill stresses that the agricultural industry can be a fickle one.

“Theoretically, that increases the cost to producing food and that could mean higher prices in the supermarket. It doesn’t necessarily mean that. It could have an effect 2 years from now, as opposed to the next 3 months,” says O’Neill.

O’Neill says farmers who use irrigation systems – like those who grow fruits and vegetables – have largely been okay despite the relative lack of rain.

He points out that crop insurance will help cover some of the losses for farmers who are suffering because of the drought.

“Every year when we have situations like this I hear from two farmers in the same county, maybe they’re ten miles away, where one of their crop is doing extremely well and another one has had no rain and is doing very poorly,” he adds.