Grocery shopping is something we all do frequently. FMI, The Food Industry Association, says that the average American goes shopping approximately 1.6 times a week. So we've all seen that our grocery budgets seem to not go quite as far as it used to. But the total at the checkout starts long before our food gets to the grocery store shelves: they're an amalgamation of several factors including farming, food processing, manufacturing, transportation, and wholesale/retail networks that add costs before we put the groceries in our cart.
According to recent polling, 82 percent of voters support cutting regulations on farmers and protecting farmlands as a way to help lower grocery costs; 78 percent say that lowering energy costs can also lower grocery prices.
The USDA Economic Research Service (ERS) laid out the price spreads — what consumers pay for goods versus the prices farmers receive for corresponding commodities. For example, the 2025 retail price for a pound of butter was $4.74; farmers received $2.01 and for one gallon of milk, the retail price is $4.07 while farmers receive $1.94. The aforementioned processing, manufacturing, wholesale/retail, and transportation costs factor into that spread.
Another factor to agricultural inputs is fertilizer. Fertilizer can account for 33 to 45 percent of operating costs for corn and wheat farmers, according to industry data cited by Townhall. One of the things Washington can do to help mitigate these costs is work toward ending the sale of fertilizer inputs to foreign adversaries.
The impact of energy prices on farming and food costs is another factor impacting our grocery bills. Back in March, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins addressed the energy concerns and fertilizer costs. "So, two quick things on that. The first is, what the fertilizer situation in America looks like right now. The good news is, a supermajority, almost all of our farmers, put their fertilizer orders in last fall. So there shouldn't be too much of a disruption or an increase in the cost of planting for at least most of our farmers," she said at the time. She also noted working on reshoring fertilizer is something the administration is working on. "Because of the president's focus on energy, and energy independence, we're actually, in America, in a much better situation on the pricing of fertilizer than almost the rest of the world. So that's all really good news that you pivot to. But there's still so much to do. We gotta reshore our fertilizer back into America, we're going to be working on that, for the long term." Fuel costs, including diesel, also impact energy prices.
Competition is another factor, and the Trump administration has worked to increase competition in meat processing by breaking up meat processors' unfair advantage in negotiations with meat buyers. President Trump also pushed for farmers and ranchers to process their own food. In a Truth Social post from August 28, the president wrote, "Ranchers and Farmers have always been a number one priority for me. They work very hard, are smart, efficient, and immaculately clean, but for years I have heard that they have had a tremendous problem with the Big Processors, who many say are a nasty Monopoly. There are, essentially, four of them, a very non competitive number, and they make life miserable for our wonderful Farmers and Ranchers, and I can’t let that happen, can I? So, in order to break this powerful monopoly, with much of its ownership based outside of the U.S., I am authorizing legal documents to be drawn in order to allow Farmers and Ranchers to be given the right to PROCESS THEIR OWN FOOD. This should move quickly. Thank you for your attention to this matter!"
Foreign ownership of meat processors is not the only foreign ownership issue raising prices. The USDA reports that 46 million acres of U.S. agricultural land were foreign-held as of the end of 2024. While it does not materially prove that foreign ownership is raising prices, it shows the massive scale of foreign ownership and raises legitimate national-security concerns. In January, the Trump administration announced a portal for reporting foreign-owned agricultural land transactions to streamline reporting and increase "transparency and scrutiny of one of our most valuable assets."
“President Trump is putting America First, and this includes increasing transparency and scrutiny of one of our most valuable national assets, American farmland. We are working to improve reporting of foreign owned land in the United States. This move to streamline the reporting portal will increase compliance and assist our efforts to effectively enforce farm accurate reporting of interests held by foreign adversaries in U.S. farmland,” said Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins. “The online portal will allow us to obtain verifiable information about foreign interests in American agricultural land and protect the security of our farmers.”
While there's no single solution to grocery affordability, it's clear from the polling that Americans understand, at a fundamental level, that there's a connection between agricultural regulations, energy prices, manufacturing, transportation, and what they're paying at the store. This presents an opportunity for Washington to address each of these issues in a holistic approach that will make things more affordable for Americans.
Editor’s Note: The 2026 Midterms will determine the fate of President Trump’s America First agenda. Republicans must maintain control of both chambers of Congress.
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