Before 1950, farms were everywhere - small to medium sized and run by families or extended families. By the 1980s, farms were large, capital-intensive ventures - and the loss of those was a serious problem because it led to obvious decreases in food production here in the US. As agriculture became more and more technological, it forced more marginal farms to the edge and beyond. But that was the cost of paying the absolute lowest price for food, right?
So, when we started the farm, we almost immediately got a survey to complete for the USDA about the farm size, crops, and numbers. That survey became part of the periodic Census of Agriculture and last month the New York Times reported on the results.
1. There are more small/tiny farms - more than 900,000 of the 2,200,000 farms had less than $2500 of gross income. Tiny tiny tiny with very different needs and very different crops than the big boys of farming.
2. Tiny Farms Fit Tiny Niches - Tom Vilsack, ex-gov of Iowa and the new Secretary of Agriculture, acknowledged that there was a more diverse marketplace today, due to those smaller farms meeting niche markets better. But there needed to be more support for those farmers.
3. Less than half of the 2.2 million farms make a profit - so the remainder rely on off-farm income to subsidize the farm. That off-farm percentage is up 10% since the last Census in 2003.
4. The Northeast is doing OK and doing terrible - This blow-up of just the Northeast shows the county-by-county view of net 20 or more farms gained (green dots) and net 20 or more farms lost (orange dots). Sucks to be in New York, great in VT and NH. What do you bet most of those losses are dairy farms?
You can read more:
- US Summary
- NY State Summary
- Rensselaer County Summary (more NYS counties here)
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