Wert-Berater, Inc. is an independent crop farming feasibility study consultant preparing lender- and agency-ready analyses for row-crop operations, farm acquisitions, expansions, irrigation projects, and specialty-crop enterprises. Our studies evaluate historic and supportable yield, commodity pricing, crop mix, soil and water conditions, seed and input costs, irrigation economics, marketing channels, working capital, debt service, and downside sensitivity using project-specific agricultural data. 4,000+ engagements since 1998 covering $41.2 billion in evaluated project value.
Crop feasibility resolves to yield times price under cost discipline. The controlling questions are what the ground can actually produce given its soil classification and documented yield history, what that production is worth after basis and marketing decisions, what it costs to grow at current input prices, and whether the margin that remains services the proposed debt through a low-yield year and a low-price year occurring together. Specialty and organic programs add a certification timeline and a transition period during which premium pricing is not yet available.
Methodology is built on USDA NASS Quick Stats county and state yield and price series, USDA Economic Research Service cost-of-production accounts, current university Cooperative Extension enterprise budgets for the specific crop and region, NRCS Web Soil Survey classification, and the operator’s own Farm Service Agency records and actual production history. Where local evidence exists it governs; national averages are used only to provide context, never to substitute for a documented farm-level record.
Every Wert-Berater financial model is fully linked with no hardcoded values, so any reviewer can stress any input. Deliverables comprise a complete narrative report and the linked Excel model, with ten-year pro forma, sensitivity analysis at ±5, 10, and 15 percent, interest-rate stress from +0.5 to +3.0 percent, and ratio analysis benchmarked against USDA ERS farm financial ratios and regional extension enterprise budgets for the applicable crop.
Primary crop production is financed differently from most commercial asset classes, and the study is written to the standard of the institution actually underwriting it. Farm Service Agency direct and guaranteed farm loan programs and Farm Credit System institutions are the principal sources of credit for production agriculture, and both weigh documented production history, working-capital adequacy, and crop-insurance coverage alongside projected coverage. Conventional agricultural lenders set their own coverage standard, commonly but not universally 1.20x. USDA Business & Industry lending is directed at rural business enterprises rather than primary agricultural production, and SBA eligibility for farming operations is limited and fact-specific. We do not assume any particular programme applies to a given operation; eligibility is determined by the lender and the agency on the facts of the applicant, and the study is prepared to the standard of whichever programme is actually in play.
Wert-Berater has completed 4,000+ engagements since 1998 covering $41.2 billion in evaluated project value, and the USDA practice is a substantial part of that record. We do not, however, hold a published completed engagement for a row-crop production operation, and we will not present adjacent work as though it were one. The firm’s nearest published agricultural engagements are a $17,350,000 controlled-environment greenhouse study in Radium Springs, New Mexico completed under USDA Business & Industry, a $38,110,000 sugar refinery restoration in Santa Rosa, Texas, and a $32,240,000 fertilizer manufacturing study in Jacksonville, Florida. Those are horticultural production, agricultural processing, and agricultural input manufacturing respectively — genuinely adjacent to row-crop economics in their treatment of commodity pricing, agricultural offtake, and USDA documentation, but not substitutes for a row-crop production record. Independence is non-negotiable: determinations follow the evidence and are not revised under pressure.
A crop farming feasibility study is not a business-plan review with a yield table attached. It is a structured determination of whether a specific parcel, a specific operator, and a specific crop rotation can service proposed debt under realistic and stressed conditions. The analysis begins with the productive capacity of the ground itself and works forward through pricing, cost, and capital structure to a coverage conclusion a credit officer can interrogate line by line.
Yield is the single most consequential assumption in a crop study, and it is the one most often overstated. We do not adopt a county average or a seed-company trial result as the projected yield for a specific farm. The starting point is the operator’s own actual production history as filed with the crop insurance agent, because that record is independently reported and carries consequences for misstatement. That history is then compared against the USDA NASS county series for the same crop and years to establish whether the farm runs above, at, or below its county, and by how consistently.
Where the operator has no history on the subject ground — an acquisition, a first-generation entrant, or a conversion from pasture — the projection is built from the soil’s capability class and the documented results of comparable ground in the same soil association, and it is held below the county mean until the operator establishes a record. A yield assumption that has never been achieved on the parcel in question is a projection, not evidence, and the study says so plainly.
Crop mix matters because rotation changes both the revenue profile and the cost structure. A corn-soybean rotation carries different nitrogen requirements, different machinery demands, and different price correlations than a continuous-corn program or a rotation that includes wheat or a specialty crop. The model reflects the rotation actually proposed, acre by acre and year by year, rather than applying a single blended margin across the whole operation.
Price is modeled from published series, not from a sponsor’s expectation. We use USDA NASS marketing-year average prices and USDA ERS outlook material to establish a defensible central case, and we apply the local basis actually available to the operation — the difference between the futures reference and the bid at the elevator or processor the farm can economically reach. Basis is a real and frequently underestimated cost: a farm forty miles from the nearest bid competes on a different net price than one adjacent to a river terminal, and the study quantifies that difference rather than assuming a national price.
Marketing risk is assessed on what the operator actually does, not on what a marketing plan says. Forward contracts, hedge positions, and elevator agreements already in place are treated as evidence of realized price; unexecuted intentions are not. Where a substantial share of projected revenue depends on a marketing strategy the operator has not previously executed, that is identified as an execution risk and the base case is built without crediting it.
Commodity cycles are addressed explicitly. Row-crop margins compress and expand across multi-year cycles driven by acreage response, global supply, and input-price movement. A study that projects a favorable current margin flat across ten years is not a feasibility analysis. Coverage is tested against price levels the crop has actually traded at within the recent cycle, and the report states the price at which coverage falls below the applicable minimum.
Input cost is built from current-season quotes and current extension enterprise budgets, not from the prior year’s actuals. Fertilizer in particular moves sharply with natural-gas and international supply conditions, and a nitrogen assumption carried forward from a low-price year will understate cost materially. Where the operator has secured prepaid inputs or a supply contract, that pricing is used for the covered period and market pricing resumes thereafter.
The cost schedule is built per acre and per crop, and it separates the components that scale with acreage from those that do not. Seed, fertilizer, crop protection, crop insurance premium, drying, and hauling scale with production. Machinery ownership cost, depreciation, family living withdrawal, insurance, and property taxes do not, and treating them as variable is one of the more common errors in sponsor-prepared projections. Custom-hire and machinery-replacement assumptions are examined against the age and condition of the existing equipment line, because a fleet at the end of its life carries a capital requirement the pro forma must show.
Labor is modeled at the wage the operation will actually have to pay in its own labor market, including seasonal and H-2A cost where the crop requires hand labor. Family labor is not costed at zero; a study that omits an operator withdrawal is not showing the cash flow the household actually needs.
Where yield depends on irrigation, water is a feasibility question in its own right and is analyzed separately from the crop budget. The review establishes the physical source and its reliability, the legal right and its seniority, the delivery infrastructure and its condition, and the full cost of applying water including energy, maintenance, and any district assessment.
Right seniority governs risk. A junior surface right in an over-appropriated basin is subject to curtailment in exactly the dry years when irrigation matters most, and modeling full delivery in every year of a ten-year pro forma misstates the risk profile. Groundwater rights face a parallel question where a basin is under a management plan or adjudication that limits withdrawal or steps it down over time. The study reflects the allocation the operation can actually rely on, and where curtailment is a realistic possibility it runs a partial-irrigation scenario alongside the base case to bound the downside.
Energy cost for pumping is modeled at the operation’s actual tariff and lift, because a deep well on a high-demand rate schedule is a materially different cost structure than gravity delivery from a district canal. We do not provide water-right legal opinions or irrigation engineering; where the right is contested or the delivery system requires engineering assessment, that work is a separate professional input and the study identifies the need rather than substituting for it.
The enterprise budget is the analytical core of a crop study. Each crop in the rotation gets its own per-acre budget with its own yield, price, and cost schedule, and the whole-farm result is the acreage-weighted composite of those budgets across the rotation cycle rather than a single blended average. This matters because rotations are rarely uniform in profitability: a legume year may carry a lower gross margin while reducing the following year’s nitrogen requirement, and a study that averages across the rotation obscures both the weak year and the agronomic reason for it.
Budgets are anchored to current university Cooperative Extension publications for the state or region, which are revised annually and reflect local machinery complements, custom rates, and input pricing. Where the operation’s own historical cost record diverges materially from the extension benchmark, the divergence is examined rather than reconciled away — an operator consistently below benchmark may have genuine scale or management advantages, or may be deferring maintenance and machinery replacement in a way the pro forma must eventually recognize.
Row-crop farming is a seasonal-cash-flow business, and annual profitability tells a lender very little about whether the operation can fund a crop. Inputs are purchased and applied months before revenue arrives, and in most rotations the peak borrowing requirement occurs well before harvest. The study models cash flow monthly through the production year to establish the peak operating-line requirement, the point in the season at which it occurs, and whether the proposed line is adequately sized to reach it.
Working-capital adequacy is assessed on the balance sheet as well as the cash-flow statement. Current ratio and working capital per acre are set against USDA ERS farm financial benchmarks and regional extension standards, because an operation that is profitable on paper but carries no liquidity buffer cannot absorb a single poor year. Where term debt and operating debt are both proposed, the analysis tests them together: term debt coverage that works in isolation can fail once the operating line is fully drawn at its seasonal peak.
The financial conclusion is a coverage determination under stress, not a single base-case ratio. The model produces a ten-year pro forma with sensitivity at ±5, 10, and 15 percent applied to yield and price independently and in combination, and interest-rate stress from +0.5 to +3.0 percent in half-point increments against the quoted rate.
Combined stress is the test that matters in production agriculture. Yield and price are partially and imperfectly correlated: a regional drought may lift price while destroying local production, and a national bumper crop may depress price in a year of good local yield. Testing a 15 percent yield reduction and a 15 percent price reduction separately understates the risk; the study runs them together and reports the coverage that results. Where irrigation reliability is uncertain, a partial-irrigation scenario is run as an additional case.
The report states the specific combination of yield and price at which coverage falls below the applicable minimum, so the lender knows precisely how much margin of safety the credit carries. An explicit statement of conditions identifies the information relied upon and the assumptions that would change the finding if they proved incorrect.
This is an economic and financial feasibility analysis. It does not replace agronomic, soil-science, or water-resource technical opinions, and it does not constitute a water-right legal opinion or an irrigation engineering design. Where a project requires a soil investigation, an agronomic program, a water-right determination, or irrigation engineering, those reports are professional inputs to the economic analysis and the study identifies where it has relied on them.
Related engagements: where grain is stored, handled, or originated commercially, see our grain elevator and feed mill feasibility study practice. Where a producer proposes to process or market a commodity to capture margin beyond the farm gate, a USDA Value-Added Producer Grant feasibility study addresses that programme directly. For protected or indoor production, see greenhouse and controlled environment agriculture, and for tree and vine crops with a multi-year establishment period, see vineyard, orchard and permanent crop feasibility studies.
A crop farming feasibility study consultant determines whether a specific parcel, operator, and crop rotation can service proposed debt under realistic and stressed conditions. The analysis covers soil productivity and land capability, documented yield history, crop-budget economics built from current extension benchmarks, commodity pricing and local basis, input costs, irrigation availability and cost, the seasonal working-capital requirement, and coverage tested under combined yield and price stress.
The output is a narrative report and a fully linked financial model, both prepared for the lender or agency rather than for the borrower.
The starting point is the operator’s actual production history as filed with the crop insurance agent, because that record is independently reported. It is compared against the USDA NASS county series for the same crop and years to establish whether the farm runs above or below its county and how consistently.
Where there is no history on the subject ground, the projection is built from the soil’s capability class and documented results on comparable ground in the same soil association, and held below the county mean until the operator establishes a record. A yield never achieved on the parcel is treated as a projection, not as evidence.
Prices are modeled from USDA NASS marketing-year average series and USDA ERS outlook material rather than from a sponsor’s expectation, and the local basis actually available to the operation is applied to arrive at a net farm-gate price. Basis is quantified specifically, because distance from a competitive bid materially changes realized price.
Coverage is then tested against price levels the crop has actually traded at within the recent cycle. The report states the price at which coverage falls below the applicable minimum.
Input costs are built per acre and per crop from current-season quotes and current university Cooperative Extension enterprise budgets, not from the prior year’s actuals. Fertilizer is treated with particular care because it moves sharply with energy and international supply conditions.
The schedule separates costs that scale with production — seed, fertilizer, crop protection, insurance premium, drying, hauling — from those that do not, including machinery ownership cost, depreciation, insurance, and the operator withdrawal. Family labor is not costed at zero.
Irrigation is analyzed separately from the crop budget because it is a feasibility question in its own right. The review establishes the physical source and its reliability, the legal right and its seniority, the delivery infrastructure, and the full applied cost including energy at the operation’s actual tariff and lift, maintenance, and any district assessment.
Where a right is junior in an over-appropriated basin or a groundwater basin is under a management plan, the study models the allocation the operation can actually rely on and runs a partial-irrigation scenario alongside the base case.
Weather risk is expressed through the yield distribution rather than as a separate line item. The operator’s own production history captures the realized variability of the specific ground, including the poor years, and that variability drives the stress range applied in the model.
Crop insurance coverage is then examined as the mitigating instrument: the coverage level elected, the units structure, and the indemnity the operation would actually receive in a loss year. An operation carrying minimal coverage on ground with volatile history is a materially different credit than one carrying high coverage, and the study reflects that.
Cash flow is modeled monthly through the production year rather than annually, because inputs are purchased and applied months before revenue arrives. That establishes the peak operating-line requirement, the point in the season it occurs, and whether the proposed line is sized to reach it.
Working-capital adequacy is also assessed on the balance sheet through current ratio and working capital per acre, benchmarked against USDA ERS farm financial data. Term debt and operating debt are tested together, because term coverage that works in isolation can fail with the operating line fully drawn.
Lenders financing production agriculture generally expect documented production history rather than projected yield, a crop budget tied to a recognized benchmark, evidence of the marketing plan actually in place, confirmation of water availability where irrigation carries the yield, and coverage demonstrated under stress rather than only at base case.
They also expect the study to be independent, with no portion of the fee contingent on loan approval. Farm Service Agency and Farm Credit lenders weigh working-capital adequacy and crop-insurance coverage heavily alongside projected coverage.
That depends entirely on the applicant and is determined by the lender and the agency, not by us. Farm Service Agency direct and guaranteed farm loan programmes and Farm Credit System institutions are the principal sources of credit for primary production agriculture, and conventional agricultural lenders set their own coverage standard, commonly around 1.20x.
USDA Business & Industry lending is directed at rural business enterprises rather than primary agricultural production, and SBA eligibility for farming operations is limited and fact-specific. We do not assume a programme applies; the study is prepared to the standard of whichever programme is actually in play.
The fee is fixed and quoted within one business day of the initial inquiry. It does not vary with the study’s finding and is never contingent on loan approval — that structure is what makes an independent determination possible and is required for third-party feasibility work under the federal programmes.
Because scope varies with acreage, crop mix, irrigation complexity, and the lending programme involved, we quote after a brief intake conversation rather than publishing a schedule.
Standard delivery is ten to fifteen business days from receipt of a complete data room. Rush delivery is available when a lender’s commitment deadline requires it.
The most common cause of delay is an incomplete data room, so we identify missing items at intake rather than at the end.
A crop farming engagement typically requires FSA farm records and crop history, actual production history from the crop insurance agent, soil maps or NRCS Web Soil Survey output for the subject ground, the most recent three years of operator tax returns including Schedule F, a current balance sheet, water-right documentation or irrigation district agreements where applicable, any marketing contracts or elevator agreements in place, an equipment schedule, and the proposed loan term sheet.
Missing items do not prevent a start; they are identified at intake so the sponsor can assemble them while work begins on the sections that do not depend on them.
Qualify a project. Tell us about the project and the program. We will tell you the truth about it — scope, timeline, and fee confirmed before work begins.
Schedule a Zoom Call →Legal disclosure. Wert-Berater, Inc. offices are mailing addresses only. Following the COVID-19 pandemic the firm has elected to work remotely; its office locations receive mail and are not staffed for visitors or in-person meetings. Headquarters mailing address: 1968 South Coast Hwy, Ste 2382, Laguna Beach, CA 92651.
Wert-Berater, Inc. is an independent provider of feasibility studies and other related services. The firm does not provide financing or equity investment advice, and does not arrange, broker, or place debt or equity capital of any kind.
All appraisal assignments are performed by Bruce E. Jones, MAI, ASA-GC, BCA, CMEA, a member of the Appraisal Institute since 2006, a staff member of Wert-Berater, Inc. and owner of Special Purpose Realty Valuation.