"Famine Is Coming"
by Qasem Al-Ali
"70% of American farmers can no longer afford the fertilizer they need. This isn’t a headline from a war zone. This is happening inside the United States. Right now. During planting season. This comes from an official survey by the American Farm Bureau Federation. 5,700+ farmers. All 50 states. Conducted April 3–11, 2026. Not an estimate. Not a projection. A snapshot of American agriculture in real time. Since Hormuz closed, fertilizer prices collapsed any sense of normalcy:
- Urea: +49%
- UAN: +38%
- NH3: +32%
- Farm diesel: +46%
Farmers don’t set these prices. They just pay them. The South is bleeding the most. 80% of Southern farmers can’t afford full fertilizer applications. Only 19% locked in prices before the season. Compare that to 67% in the Midwest who pre-booked.
Timing saved some. Geography punished others. 94% of farmers say their financial situation has gotten worse or stayed the same vs. last year. Only 6% improved. The farm economy isn’t struggling. It’s breaking.
Hormuz didn’t just close a shipping lane. It closed the margin between profit and loss for millions of American farmers. Less fertilizer = lower yields = less food. The grocery bill shock hasn’t arrived yet. It’s still growing in the field.
Oil has OPEC. Oil has futures markets. Oil has headlines. Food has nothing. No cartel to manage supply. No sovereign fund to absorb the shock. No prime-time coverage. When oil gets expensive, markets panic. When food gets expensive, the poor starve. That’s the difference nobody is talking about."
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