For 26 years the North Dakota State University Extension Service’s Ag Producers Income Tax Management Program has helped North Dakotans and residents of adjacent states.
The annual interactive video program, set this year for Nov. 28 at nine counties across North Dakota, will again focus on federal income tax updates and year-end tax management decisions.
“We try to provide information that will help ag producers and tax practitioners understand the changes and make better decisions,” says Andy Swenson, farm management specialist with the NDSU extension, which, along with the Internal Revenue Service, is sponsoring the program.
Among the many topics to be examined during the three-hour program, which includes four question-and-answer periods: succession planning, depreciation rules, farm income averaging and net operating losses.
Normally, the program doesn’t cover net operating losses. But poor crop prices this year - and expectations that most ag producers would finish well in the red - led organizers to include it this time, Swenson says.
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Excellent overall crop yields will help to offset poor prices and reduce the level of loss expected earlier, however, he says.
The program will feature presentations by Ann Makres with the IRS, Judy Gilbertson with AgCountry Farm Credit Services in Jamestown, N.D., Rhonda Mahlum with Mahlum Goodhart in Mandan, N.D., Jess Nehl with Eide Bailly in Bismarck, N.D., and Brent Roeder with Eide Bailly in Fargo, N.D.
The interactive sites are Bismarck State College, North Dakota School for the Deaf in Devils Lake, Dickinson State University, the Grand Forks County Office Building, the Jamestown Law Enforcement Center, the North Dakota State College of Science in Wahpeton, and the NDSU Research Extension centers in Minot and Langdon.
Preregistration is required because seating is limited. The cost for the program and materials is $15. For more information or to register, call the NDSU extension service in Fargo at (701) 231-8642.
When the program began, almost all of the attendees were ag producers. But over time, income taxes have become more complicated and more farmers have turned over their taxes to professionals. So today, the program draws more tax practitioners than ag producers, though it also can be of value to producers, Swenson says.
