By STAN MADDUX

Indiana Correspondent

INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. — Farmers played a major role in shipments at all three Indiana ports last year, shattering the previous record.

The ports at Burns Harbor, Jeffersonville and Mount Vernon handled 14.8 million tons of cargo in 2018, according to the Ports of Indiana. It was a 25 percent increase from 2017, and 21 percent higher than the previous record set in 2015, officials said.

They said 2018 was also the first time the Ports of Indiana broke shipment records in each quarter and the fifth consecutive year the three ports combined handled more than 10 million tons of cargo. A 58 percent increase in coal shipments was a major factor in the record-setting year.

There was also a 26 percent increase in soy products and a 17 percent increase in grain handled at the ports, officials said. Steel shipments were up 4 percent.

“We are so grateful for such an extraordinary year and fully appreciate what it took on behalf of all our port businesses and employees to achieve this kind of high-water mark,” said Vanta E. Coda II, CEO of Ports of Indiana.

The gains in volume follow expansions at the facilities in Burns Harbor along Lake Michigan and Jeffersonville along the Ohio River. Investments on existing infrastructure were also made at those two ports and the other one along the Ohio River at Mount Vernon.

“Each of our ports builds and maintains exceptional infrastructure to allow our world-class port businesses to leverage what Indiana does exceedingly well: Manufacture the products essential for modern life and move food products for the world,” Coda said.

Ports at Burns Harbor and Jeffersonville collectively moved more than 2 million tons of steel, the largest commodity at each port. The Mount Vernon port handled 61 percent more coal from the previous year and saw increases in ethanol, soy products and dried distillers grains.

Chris Hurt, an agricultural economics professor at Purdue University, said the increase in farm goods moving through the ports reflects strong yields of corn and soybeans from Indiana in 2017 and some of the record yields in the state last year.

He said Indiana farmers produced 194 bushels per acre of corn and 60 bushels of soybeans per acre in 2018. “We had a lot to sell. We had a lot to export. That’s probably a contributor,” he noted.

Hurt said grain production from Indiana alone doesn’t make much, if any, difference on prices, which remain low. But he said ports handling greater volumes of product efficiently does help farmers reach new markets and keep transportation costs down.

“Those things do benefit farmers,” he explained.

He said grain moving through ports in 2019 could go down because of China dramatically reducing the amount of corn and soybeans it buys from the United States in response to tariffs stemming from the ongoing trade war between the countries.

Some of what China used to buy is being sold to some countries in Europe, Africa and South America, but a good percentage of the surplus, so far, has not been absorbed, Hurt said.

He also said more goods handled at the ports can also be an indicator of a stronger worldwide economy. “When people have more money out in the world, they tend to spend more and buy more and that includes these things like commodities,” he said.

There’s still talk of Indiana building a third Ohio River port near Lawrenceburg, about 30 miles west of Cincinnati. A Dec. 31 deadline for the state to exercise its option to purchase land for its construction has been extended to June 30.

Hurt spoke favorably about the prospects of Indiana adding another port because of the potential it provides farmers to move more product. He said there would also be more jobs and business activity related to shipping, for the local area.