Henderson farmer Bob McIndoo says the arrival of Greenfield Grain at the Henderson riverport will have multiple effects on the area agricultural community, most notably better prices for offloading crops.
The costs could be “two or three or five cents a bushel but it adds up,” he said.
Greenfield Grain recently received final permit approval to begin building a grain elevator and four silos that can each hold 185,000 bushels.
Henderson Economic Development Executive Director Missy Vanderpool said construction could begin late summer or early fall.
One of the key components of getting Greenfield to build here was a $500,000 incentive supplied by Henderson County Fiscal Court, she said.
According to figures she referred to in an interview with the Hendersonian, the grain elevator will be able to offload 75 trucks per hour, 750 trucks per day, which is more than the other two grain elevators in the county combined. Those facilities are Viterra, formerly Gavilon, located off South Main Street, and ADM Grain on Old Geneva Road.
The promised offloading speed of the Greenfield Grain facility is another aspect that excites area farmers, McIndoo said.
During offload times at Viterra, a line of trucks sit in the middle of South Main Street as drivers wait to get into the facility. The wait, McIndoo said, is what frustrates farmers.
“It is very important that the farmers can keep moving during harvest season and whenever an elevator gets backed up because everyone is trying to get their crop out at the same time,” said Jessica James, Extension Agent for Agriculture and Natural Resources at the Henderson Extension office.
McIndoo and James said the costs per bushel haven’t been determined. But even fours cents extra per bushel will make a difference to farmers.
In an off-the-cuff projection, McIndoo said one acre typically yields 200 bushels of corn. At 4 cents a bushel, that comes to $8 an acre. A farmer who works 1,000 acres could make an extra $8,000 in this projection.
James said there are 87 farms with more than 1,00o acres in the county.
The grain elevators currently in use in the county were built decades ago, when bushels per acre were lower and output was 60%-70% of a modern-day yield, McIndoo said.
McIndoo said the agriculture community is excited about the competitive pricing and speed it will bring.
“(Farmers) are all 100% on board,” he said.
