For the second year in a row, the value of Iowa farmland has fallen. According to the survey done by Iowa State University, an average acre of Iowa farmland is worth 17-hundred-81 dollars this year, a drop of a little over one percent from last year.Professor Mike Duffy is an I-S-U Extension economist and director of the Iowa Farmland Value Survey. He says the report holds both good and bad news, depending on who is doing the asking.Duffy says several factors are helping keep the value of Iowa land from dropping still farther, including the strong stock market that is holding up land values. Duffy says the value of farmland has taken a few dips over the past two decades. The peak in value was in 1981 at 21-hundred-47 dollars per acre. It bottomed out in 1986 at 787 dollars an acre, then rose every year until last year.
