Harvest is a special time on a Midwestern row crop farm. It is the culmination of months of work and preparation, weeks of worry and anticipation, and hundreds of thousands of dollars of investment. It is what a farmer thinks about from the moment the first row is furrowed in the spring and the first bag of seed is poured into the planter.

Harvest is a time of long hours and high tension. It is a time when other priorities are set aside, and when family and neighbors come together in a common effort.

Most Americans, who enjoy the bounty of this harvest, are woefully ignorant of what is involved and what it means. They do not connect the abundance of the grocery store to the cycle of planting and harvest that make that abundance possible. They never give a moment’s thought to how a poor harvest would change their lives and impact the entire world.

Even our ever vigilant 24-hour news channels missed the food crisis that occurred this summer which almost brought the world to the brink of a food security disaster.

As I write, combines are moving across the corn and soybean fields of the Midwest bringing in a corn crop of more than 13 billion bushels and 3 billion bushel soybean crop. While yields are down from what farmers and the USDA had forecast in August, it is still a big crop.

According to the latest figures, corn production is forecast at a record 13.2 billion bushels, up from the previous record of 13.1 billion bushels. Soybean production is forecast at a record high 3.48 billion bushels, 4 percent above last year. In 2008, in an attempt to discredit ethanol, fearmongers claimed we had to choose between food and fuel. American farmers and Mother Nature have proven them wrong.

Not only is American agriculture meeting the food and fuel demand, it has helped the world overcome a major agricultural disaster. A severe drought in Russia killed one-third of that nation’s grain crop. Russia is the world’s third largest exporter of wheat; so when Russian officials cut off exports of wheat, the world hit the panic button.

Egypt and several other Middle Eastern nations, who were big buyers of Russian wheat, hit the world market buying wheat at any price. World wheat prices skyrocketed. Making the situation worse was the fact that U.S. wheat production was also down.

In June, the USDA estimated U.S. wheat production at 54.3 million acres, down 8 percent from 2009. This is the lowest U.S. total since 1971. The “Chicken Little” media predicted food shortages and sharply higher food prices, but this did not occur.

In fact, according to a report from the UN Food and Agricultural Organization, the number of hungry people in the world dropped about 10 percent, to below 1 billion, for the first time in 15 years. According to a report titled The State of Food Insecurity in the World, which will be jointly published by FAO and World Food Program (WFP) in October, about 925 million people are undernourished in 2010, compared to 1.02 billion in 2009.

This is mainly a result of renewed economic growth this year, combined with the drop in food prices since mid-2008, the FAO said in a statement. The record U.S. corn harvest will help fill the void in world grain output.

This world wheat shortage will also be short lived because of the market-oriented nature of U.S. agriculture.

Record high wheat prices will spur a big jump in U.S. wheat production. Purdue Economist Chris Hurt predicted there would be a 50-75 percent increase in the amount of wheat planted in the Eastern Corn Belt this fall over 2009, a record-low year.

Indiana farmers planted 300,000 acres of wheat last fall, which annually is the state’s third-largest crop behind corn (6 million acres this year) and soybeans (5.3 million acres).

When farmers are allowed to respond to market signals, they will do so. Hurt said the record harvest of 2010 is good news for farmers and consumers, “If you like to eat and drive your car, this is good news.”

The biggest threat to this miracle of modern food production is the indifference of American consumers and U.S. policy makers.

Modern farming technology must be protected and improved. World food production will continue to grow, and farmers worldwide must be allowed to use the tools to meet that demand.

As the combines kick up dust moving across the fields, the EPA is proposing regulations on farm dust. Likewise, many crop production and protection tools are being regulated out of use. Estate law changes may make it impossible to transfer farming operations to the next generation.

Meanwhile, consumers browse the grocery store aisles blissfully ignorant of how or why the food got there and of how important a good harvest is to keeping those shelves full. Just down the road, a farmer begins a 20-hour day bringing in his livelihood that will feed nation and the world.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Gary Truitt may write to him in care of this publication.