Profitability spreadsheet workshops set in South Plains

The Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service will be holding three free workshops to better help farmers understand and utilize profitability spreadsheets for their crop budgets. 

A Profitability Workshop will be held on Jan. 28 and again on Feb. 16 at the Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center, 1102 Drew St., Lubbock. On March 2,  the same workshop will be held in Plainview at the AgriLife Extension office in Hale County at 225 Broadway, Suite 6.

The workshops will be from 9 a.m.-noon each day. The events are sponsored by the Texas State Support Committee-Cotton Incorporated and lunch is included.

“Texas farmers have been using this spreadsheet for 20 years to estimate the relative profitability of different crops using their own production history,” said Will Keeling, AgriLife Extension risk management specialist, Lubbock.

He said participants are encouraged to bring their own computers, but they aren’t necessary as everything will be demonstrated on screen.

Topics, speakers, objectives 

The presenters will be speaking on the following topics at each of the workshops .

• Grain Markets Outlook – Mark Welch, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension economist in the Department of Agricultural Economics, Bryan-College Station.
• Cotton Market Outlook – John Robinson, Ph.D., AgriLife Extension cotton marketing economist, Bryan-College Station.
• Overview of Budgets and Profitability Spreadsheet – Keeling.

“These workshops are funded by a grant from the Texas State Support Committee which enables us to develop a crop-budget projection tool and conduct training workshops such as these,” he said. “The primary objective of the workshop will be to demonstrate how spreadsheet budgets can be used to help producers determine break-even yields, break-even prices, returns above variable costs and returns above total cost.”

For additional information, contact Dena Graves at 806-723-8412 or Keeling at 806-723-8445.