IOWA, USA — Vic Miller is a corn farmer out of Oelwein.
"I think it was 1996 or '95 we started farming in Ukraine," Miller told Local 5. "It's beautiful ground. It's just beautiful country, black dirt, six feet deep on."
Miller says the overseas operation ran for about 12 years growing corn, soybeans, sunflowers and more.
"Quite frankly, today I'm very glad we aren't still there."
With the major disruption to the country's economy and exports following Russia's invasion of Ukraine, economists believe it could mean an opportunity for U.S. farmers, especially for crops like wheat and corn.
"If they're out of the marketplace, that means the U.S. will likely make more corn and wheat sales throughout the globe," said Iowa State University Professor Chad Hart, who specializes in the crop market.
But the sliver of success farmers might see from that growing opportunity will likely be outweighed by rising costs, especially for oil, natural gas, and fertilizer.
"It's in the longer run that we'll likely see those costs especially as we look at fertilizer and fuel starting to build on our agricultural producers," Hart added.
"In fact, if we do take swift economic actions, one of those would be not to let [Russia] get paid for fertilizer exports," said Sam Funk, who works as the Director of Agriculture Analytics and Research for the Iowa Farm Bureau Federation. "We have to do what we can right now to increase the production of fertilizer."
While Vic Miller no longer runs any operations in Ukraine, his ties remain. Overnight he says he received a message from a friend in Kyiv.
"It was a very short message. He said: 'Explosions country-wide, airport closed, planes, flying overhead, long lines at food and drug stores'. And that was all that was. That was the total extent of his message."
Economists add that livestock prices dropped Thursday likely due to the rising cost of feed. In the short term, they believe this could mean lower meat prices.
However, in the long term, people should anticipate a slight increase in food prices overall. Experts add the rising price of gas is likely what consumers will notice first.
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