Deere & Co, the maker of John Deere machinery, is to cut around 125 employees from its staff at two manufacturing plants in Iowa in the US. The farm machinery giant has struggled against significant headwinds over the last number of years as dwindling farm incomes, weak commodity prices, a volatile global economy and a bullish US dollar all weigh on sales.

These latest jobs cuts announced by Deere come just a month after the group let 100 workers go from other manufacturing plants in Iowa. In 2015, Deere's full-year sales slumped by more than 20%, with the most pronounced declines coming in its South American and US markets.

The group’s outlook for 2016 is no better, with management projecting full-year equipment sales to fall by 10%, worse than its previous forecast before Christmas of a 7% drop in sales.

Deere is also forecasting net profits for 2016 of $1.3bn, which would be down almost a third compared with last year.

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Little profit to harvest for machinery manufacturers