The largest U.S. farming operations, those with more than $500,000 in annual sales, control a seemingly ever-growing portion of the country’s farmland. The annual Farms and Land in Farms report by USDA says big farmers operated 41.2 percent, or 376 million acres, of the 913 million acres of land in farms in 2015. Three years earlier, big farms accounted for just under 40 percent of U.S. farmland, or nearly 365 million acres,
At latest count, 8 percent of U.S. farms were in the largest sales categories – farms with more than $500,000 in sales or more than $1 million in sales – compared to 7.6 percent in 2012. There are 2.067 million farms at present, down nearly 1 percent from 2014 and down by 2 percent in three years. U.S. farm numbers were stable at 2.1-2.2 million for the past quarter-century and for the first time fell below 2.1 million in 2014. More than half of U.S. farms are too small to be more than hobby or part-time operations. The government defines a farm as a business with at least $1,000 a year in crop and livestock sales, or that could generate that level of sales.
U.S. farm numbers and farm population peaked in 1935 during the Great Depression when 31.8 million people – a quarter of the U.S. population – lived on 6.8 million farms, an 18 percent increase in farm numbers from 1930. Historians say job losses in cities pushed some people back to the land in an interruption of the urbanization of the country. By 1940, the number of farms fell to 6.1 million.
After World War Two, farmers adopted mechanization, hybrid seeds and chemical fertilizers and pesticides, which increased yields and productivity with the result that a smaller labor force could operate more land. By 1970s, there were less than half as many farms, 2.78 million, as in 1940.
In the new report on farm numbers, USDA said small farms, with sales of less than $10,000 a year, were the only category of farms to decline, dropping by 20,000 to 1.04 million farms. The other five sales categories grew slightly.
Far and away, Texas has the largest number of farms in the nation – 242,000 – followed by Missouri with 97,100 and Iowa with 87,500.