{"id":10914,"date":"2019-04-22T12:15:17","date_gmt":"2019-04-22T12:15:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/calcanstaging.kinsta.cloud\/?p=10914"},"modified":"2020-02-12T16:02:59","modified_gmt":"2020-02-13T00:02:59","slug":"2017-ag-census-reveals-some-bright-spots-despite-increased-farm-consolidation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calclimateag.org\/es\/2017-ag-census-reveals-some-bright-spots-despite-increased-farm-consolidation\/","title":{"rendered":"2017 Ag Census Reveals Some Bright Spots Despite Increased Farm Consolidation"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is reposted from the\u00a0National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition (NSAC)<\/a>, of which CalCAN is a member. NSAC advocates for federal policy reform for the sustainability of food systems, natural resources, and rural communities. See the\u00a0original post<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Delayed by the government shutdown, last week the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) released the long-awaited\u00a02017\u00a0<\/a>Census<\/a>\u00a0of Agriculture<\/a>. The 2017 Census surveyed nearly three million potential U.S. farms and ranches. Spearheaded by the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), the Census remains the most comprehensive source of agricultural data for state and counties across the U.S. and guides most federal farm programs, policies, and funding decisions.<\/p>\n

According to\u00a0U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Perdue<\/a>, the Census tells \u201cthe tremendous story of U.S. agriculture and how it is changing.\u201d\u00a0 And changing it is.<\/p>\n

Increased consolidation and economic concentration, declines in the number of farms, land being farmed, and farm income have occurred since the last census in 2012, and similarly, over the past decade. However, the number of beginning farmers, organic farms, and local food sales continue to climb \u2013 a bright spot in an otherwise bleak farming outlook marked by continued shrinking of the \u201cag of the middle\u201d and decreased farm profitability.<\/p>\n

Fewer, Larger Farms<\/h2>\n

Overall, the 2017 Census of Agriculture reports that the total number of farms is down nationwide, while the average farm continues to increase in size. As of 2017, there were 2.04 million farms and ranches across the U.S. \u2013 a decrease of 3.2 percent over the past 5 years. The average size of a farm, on the other hand, increased slightly to 441 acres out of a total of 900 million acres farmed in the U.S.<\/p>\n

While the total number of operations shrank, the overall value of all agricultural production decreased only slightly \u2013 meaning that as 100,000+ small and medium-sized farms transitioned out of farming over the past five years, their land (and production) were folded into larger and larger operations. This trend towards increased consolidation is evident in looking at trends across farm sizes. Over the last five years, all categories of mid-sized farms declined while very small and large farms increased in numbers (see chart below).<\/p>\n

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Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture \u2013 National Agricultural Statistics Service<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/figure>\n

Only 105,453 farms (5 percent) produced 75 percent of all sales in 2017 \u2013 12 percent fewer farms since 2012. What\u2019s more is that the largest farms (sales of $5 million or more) accounted for fewer than one percent of all farms, but 35 percent of all sales. Small farms (less than $50,000 in sales), on the other hand, accounted for 76 percent of farms but only 3 percent of sales. This continues the trend of not only consolidation, but further economic concentration of larger and larger farms producing more and more of the total food grown and raised in this country.<\/p>\n

Fewer Farms, but More Farmers?<\/h2>\n

The 2017 Census made significant revisions to the way that demographic data on individual producers was collected. Farmers \u2013 or producers as they are termed in the Census \u2013 are defined broadly as any individual making decisions about a farming operation. For the first time, the Census no longer asked farm operations to identify a \u201cPrincipal Operator\u201d but instead collected data on up to four operators (aka \u201cfarmers\u201d) per farm.<\/p>\n

This change resulted in more robust data on the role of young, beginning, and women farmers in decision-making on the farm, and also resulted in NASS actually counting more farmers, compared to previous Censuses. A few highlights on the demographics of farmers:<\/p>\n