Ag Census

Some new criteria and questions within the 2017 Census of Agriculture led to changes regarding who is considered a farm producer. Ginger Harris of the National Agricultural Statistics Service at this year's USDA AG Outlook Forum said the result was an increase in the number of farm producers and by demographics.

“Most of these newly identified producers were female. While the number of male producers fell by about one point seven percent, the number of female producers increased by nearly 27 percent. 36 percent of all producers are female, and over half of all farms have a female decision maker. On average, farms with female producers are both smaller in terms of acres, in terms of the dollars of receipts from farming.

Harris adds that the 2017 census of agriculture is similar to the prior census of 2012 and that….”there are definitely distinct regional differences in the share of female producers on farms.

In the Census of Agriculture in 2017, we counted about three point four million producers. When you're looking at the numbers comparing 2012 and 2017, you need to be careful. After the 2012 Census of agriculture, as we do, every son says, we seek feedback from data users in response to the feedback we received. We made changes to the demographic questions on the census in order to harness the data collection from all persons involved and making decisions for the Farmer Ranch. The new questions, which identify a producer as someone involved in decision making for the farm, led to more people identifying themselves as producers. The number of farms was down by about three percent from 2012. The number of producers was up by about seven percent. The main change that we saw was that more farms reported multiple producers. In 2017, the majority of farms reported two or more people involved in making decisions for the farm.

In 2012, less than half the farms reported multiple decision makers.