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US farms decrease, farm size increases

A new report from the USDA shows a slow decline in the number of farms in the country.

Dr. Michael Langemeier, professor of agriculture economics at Purdue University, tells Brownfield the decrease has been going on for several decades.

“When you see a disappearance of farms, a lot of times it’s people that are retiring from the farm and there is nobody there to takeover, or something similar to that,” he said.

Langemeier says the size of farms is increasing due to growing productivity with the use of precision agriculture.

“Those are going to be labor-saving technologies and so you’re probably going to see a reduction in the number of farmers in production agriculture, and an increase in output,” he said.

The USDA says there were 2.01 million farms in the U.S. in 2021, down from 2.2 million in 2007.

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