Symposium addresses gains and losses in agriculture

SIDNEY – Area farmers and ranchers met Tuesday at the Ag Risk Management Symposium at the Cheyenne County Fairgrounds.

The event was hosted by the Federal Crop Agency. Sidney agent Anne Rexroth said the event went really well.

“I think it went fantastic. We served about 150 people, and then there was about 50 of them that stayed after lunch for that panel," Rexroth said.

She said the event was broadcast Facebook Live with a little more than 50 engaged.

The event hosted five speakers on agricultural management. Topics included learning how to judge losses and gains and how to react accordingly, and the importance of planning: Brian Bledsoe’s talk was titled “Strategic Meteorologist Overview.” Also speaking were James Schroeder, Ben Scholl, Travis Kester and Ben Rand.

James Schroeder, Principal and founder of Quartzite Risk Management LLC, grew up on his family’s Christmas tree farm in Wisconsin and attending the University of Wisconsin. He began his career in the options industry in 2003.

He worked as Director of Marketing and Risk Management at a Wisconsin co-op before starting Quartzite Risk Management LLC in 2019. He talked about the scale of losses and how a producer should respond. He called one the big winner everyone wants. It’s two and belong that are challenging.

“Two is a small winner. Three is a small loser, and four ... the one that takes people out of the game is the big loser. That’s what you want to avoid. Take small losses when you can,” Schroeder said.

He said speculating with the market can be stressful because it goes against human nature.

“There are a lot of things that your brain does that are actually not productive with interacting with uncertainty, which is what we’re doing when we interact with markets,” he said.

Schroeder said the human brain focuses on the positive about ourselves.

“I see this all the time. Our brains want to confirm what we believe. In our minds, we are all the heroes of our own story and our brain doesn’t want to tell us otherwise,” he said.

The symposium concluded with a panel discussion.