Water levels in the U.S. Mississippi River have fallen to record lows, causing major impacts to the U.S. shipping industry and could eventually affect supply chains, Fox News reported Oct. 24.

The U.S. National Weather Service issued a forecast that water levels in the Memphis section of the Mississippi River will continue to drop below 11.1 feet (about 3.4 meters). Experts warned that water levels will continue to drop in the coming weeks.

Low water levels will have a significant impact on the U.S. shipping industry. The U.S. Department of Agriculture's transportation report indicates that the volume of freight on the Mississippi River has dropped by more than 20 percent due to difficulties in navigating the river, affecting shipments of corn, soybeans, wheat, and products such as oil.

Friedman, executive director of the American Agricultural Transportation Alliance, said, "Our members have long relied on the Mississippi River for transportation to market, and supply chain disruptions due to low water levels will affect not only U.S. food producers, but also consumers."

According to U.S. media reports on the 19th of local time, the water level of a section of the river recently fell to the lowest level since records began in 1954, with disruptions in transportation routes.

As it is now a critical time for the transportation of U.S. crops, shipping disruptions will seriously affect the transportation of U.S. agricultural products and fertilizers, affecting the stability of the agricultural supply chain and pushing up food prices.

This is not the first time this year that Mississippi River navigation disruptions. Just recently, two other important sections of the Mississippi River navigation were disruptions, and about 2,300 barges were stranded. To make matters worse, drought conditions continue to worsen, and experts expect the Mississippi River's water level to continue to drop.

The Mississippi River is the U.S. North-South shipping "artery", not only carries 92% of the nation's agricultural exports and 78% of global feed grain and soybean exports, but also bears the transportation of oil, fertilizer and other important goods.

It is understood that this season of the year, the main transport of agricultural products barges will be through the Mississippi River south, the main transport of fertilizer barges north, so the lower water level of the Mississippi River at this time will have a significant impact on the transport of agricultural products and fertilizers and exports across the United States.

Wall Street Journal columnist McWhorter: The Mississippi River's declining water level raises huge, diverse issues. The Mississippi River is a major transportation route for industrial products and crops, through which goods can reach the Gulf Coast and then be exported around the world.

The current time is when farmers harvest grain, cotton and other crops, they had hoped to make a fortune this year, but now because the river level is too low to cause disruptions in the barge system, their agricultural products are thus stuck, the volume of transport than they expected to be much less, barge transport costs are also much higher.