By Jessica Domel
Multimedia Reporter
Farmers across most of Texas are paying more to lease non-irrigated farmland.
The price per acre in the Coastal Bend rose $3.50 over the last year to the state’s highest average at $61 an acre per year, according to a new report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS).
Rent on non-irrigated farmland is up $2.50 in the Upper Gulf Coast and Lower Valley; up $2 in the South, Southeast, South Central and Northern High Plains; $1 in the Southern Low Plains; and up 50 cents in both the Blacklands and Southern High Plains.
The cheapest non-irrigated farm rent this year was in far West Texas at $7.90 per acre, per year.
Irrigated cropland is up $5 in the Southern Lower Plains, $1 in the Cross Timbers, $10 in the Southeast, $3 in the Coastal Bend, 50 cents in the Upper Gulf Coast and $1 in both South Texas and the Valley.
Farmers in the Northern High Plains pay the most, on average, to rent irrigated lands at $104 an acre.
Irrigated land is the cheapest in the Northeast.
Pastureland rates declined for the most part this year.
Rates are 10 cents higher in the Northern Low Plains, $1 higher in the Blacklands, 10 cents higher on the Edwards Plateau and 50 cents higher on the Upper Gulf Coast.
Renting pasture is most expensive in Northeast Texas and the Blacklands at $13.50 an acre, per year.
The cheapest pasture rents were recorded in the Southern High Plains at $2.70 an acre, down from $3.30 the previous year.
Statewide, the average price for pastureland is $6.60 an acre. The average price for irrigated land is $87 an acre. Meanwhile, those renting non-irrigated land pay, on average, $28 an acre.
County-by-county estimates are available from NASS every other year.
U.S. and state estimates, which include the information above, are published the first week of August each year