AFBF Wants Better NASS Reporting and Non-Family Farms Growing
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson with your Agribusiness Update.
**The American Farm Bureau Federation wants USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service to improve transparency and better embrace emerging technology in making crop estimates, determining ag census numbers and other ag reporting.
In return, according to www.agweb.com, AFBF vowed to push Congress for more funding for NASS and to encourage members to more fully participate in surveys.
The recommendations come from a 10-member NASS working group which formulated the proposal over a four-month period.
www.agweb.com/markets/grain-markets/afbf-calls-nass-increase-transparency-push-technology-use?mkt/
**Beekeepers are finishing up moving some 2.5 million honeybee colonies into California orchards to pollinate almond trees.
But, beekeepers who lost hives to wildfires last summer say it may take them more than a year to rebuild.
A Solano County beekeeper who lost most of her bees, buildings and equipment to wildfire says she will spend this spring making more hives, to be ready for the 2022 pollination season.
**America may still be a land of family farms with 96% of our 2-million farms owned by families, but more non-family farms are accounting for a growing share of ag production.
As reported by www.agriculture.com, 2017 Census of Agriculture data shows nearly 83-thousand non-family farms operate roughly 1 of every 8 acres of U.S. farmland and generate nearly $1 of every $5 in crop and livestock sales.
The number of family farms dropped 4%, and sales revenue fell 3.5%.
www.agriculture.com/news/business/non-family-farms-take-larger-share-of-us-land-and-production
