How the War in Iran Is Hitting U.S. Farmers

• 70% of farmers say they can’t afford to buy all the fertilizer their operations needed

• Nearly 60% of farmers report that their financial situation has worsened. 

When the U.S. launched air strikes on Iran on February 28, 2026, it may not have seemed obvious that a conflict on the other side of the world would touch American farms. But it has — piling fresh stress onto farmers already struggling with weak prices, climbing input costs, tariffs, and lost export markets. 

The connection runs through the Strait of Hormuz: in response to the strikes, Iran shut the strait down, freezing traffic in one of the world's most critical corridors for oil and fertilizer shipments. 

That mattered enormously to farmers, since fuel and fertilizer — both tied closely to that shipping route — are two of the most essential inputs any farm operation needs. Prices for both climbed fast once the strikes began. The timing was especially brutal: the war erupted right as planting season began, exactly when fertilizer needs to go into the ground alongside seed. Farmers who hadn't already locked in their fertilizer supply were left scrambling, paying well beyond what they'd budgeted — and those who simply couldn't absorb the added cost had to plant with less, a compromise that will show up in smaller harvests later.

The numbers behind the strain

Even as federal agencies played down the war's effect on agriculture, a Farm Bureau survey from early April 2026 told a different story: 70% of farmers surveyed said they couldn't afford to buy all the fertilizer their operations needed. Costs for some fertilizer types had climbed by as much as 25% since the conflict began. The pain wasn't evenly spread — by region, farmers unable to afford full fertilizer needs broke down as roughly 78% in the South, 69% in the Northeast, 66% in the West, and 48% in the Midwest. Nearly 60% of farmers say their financial situation has worsened. 

Fuel costs told a similar story. Global crude prices rose about 30% after the strikes began, and that fed through to a more-than-40% jump in diesel prices — the fuel that keeps most farm equipment running for planting, tending, and harvesting.

A shaky peace, on-again off-again, still unresolved

A ceasefire reached on April 7–8 brought real relief: hostilities paused, and the administration told Congress the conflict had been "terminated." Fuel and fertilizer prices began easing soon after — though economists cautioned that the financial damage already done to farmers wouldn't simply disappear. But the calm proved fragile: fighting flared intermittently through the spring, and in mid-June the U.S. and Iran signed a memorandum of understanding meant to shore up the truce, with crews working to clear mines from the strait and commercial traffic briefly ticking up to a two-month high.

It didn't last. In early July, Iran struck commercial vessels transiting the strait, and President Trump declared the ceasefire "over," notifying Congress that hostilities had formally resumed as of July 7 — restarting the 60-day clock that allows military action in the region without new congressional approval. The U.S. resumed its naval blockade of Iranian ports on July 14, and traffic through the strait, which ran around 147 crossings a day before the war, had collapsed to as few as 22 crossings by early July. Both sides have since declared the June agreement void, and the House of Representatives voted in late July to try to rein in the war — a largely symbolic move without Senate and presidential backing.

As of early August, Iran and Oman are negotiating a managed-transit arrangement that could restart some flow through the strait, though talks have stalled and restarted more than once, and oil prices have swung accordingly. 

Even if a deal lands, restarting fertilizer production and shipping lines idled for months will take time farmers don't have mid-season — leaving them, once again, facing rising costs and uncertain supply for the inputs they need to plant, grow, harvest, and ship their crops.