The message from a Metamora farmer in Blade business reporter Jim Trumm’s front page Sunday story on the uncertainty facing a northwest Ohio family farm — “each farmer is going to lose money on every acre this year” — is a sobering thought indeed.

Mark and Donna Farnsel are third-generation farmers at retirement age with 470 acres they want to remain devoted to agriculture.

But if the Trump tariffs remain in place there will be more land devoted to agriculture than American consumption requires. “We can’t depend on the United States to buy everything,” is how Mr. Farnsel puts it.

Farming is a labor of love for the Farnsels, but there’s not enough profit to tempt many others into agriculture.

Tariffs have raised the cost of fertilizer and implements while consolidation has allowed seed

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