"There will be adequate financing available for producers in 2009, said Little, the National manager of agriculture and agri-business for RBC Royal Bank.

In an interview with Farmers Forum he noted that grains and oilseeds "started out with an excellent year, which turned out to be ho-hum. But there will be lots of credit. It will be business as usual."

There was a rapid 50 per cent drop in commodity prices over two months this year, which meant that for some farmers cash flow didn’t turn out as planned, said Little, who is based in Toronto. Some farmers purchased capital assets in anticipation of having a better year, he said.

Now that a financial crisis is worldwide, with contractions even in China, there are a wide variety of factors affecting commodity prices, he said. "I’m hopeful that prices will come back up but everything is so volatile. This is like a perfect storm. There are so many variables."

The bottom line is that grains and oilseeds producers need to watch their input prices, he said, adding that hog producers should expect a better year in 2009.

There were few prognosticators on commodity prices for 2009 at the farm lenders conference, held by the American Bankers Association, Little said. "Overall the forecasters say that 2009 will be a good year, not a great year, a good year."

As for the financial crisis spreading across the globe, "it’s very uncertain how deep it all is." However, Little remarked that Americans are a resilient people and that has a tremendous impact on the future.

"America is an elastic country," he said. "It bounces back quickly. Here’s a statistic. The average American has 13 days of vacation a year and they only take six. They are hard working."