Census of Ag Concerns Pt 1
From the Ag Information Network, I’m Bob Larson. As you may have already heard, the USDA released the 2022 Census of Agriculture last week.
And Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack says some of the results were concerning, especially the number of farms and total amount of farmland across America …
VILSACK … “In 2017, when we did the survey, there were 2,042,220 farms. Today the survey reports we have 1,900,487 farms. So doing a little quick math, that's 142,000 fewer farms in five years.”
From a land perspective, Vilsack says it’s not any better …
VILSACK … “The survey tells us that in 2017, we had a little over 900 million acres of land in farming. Five years later, we have 880 million acres, so we've lost 20 million acres.”
Vilsack says the 2022 Census of Ag is a wake-up call and if there a better way …
VILSACK … “It allows us to take a snapshot in time, allows us to compare what has occurred over the five-year period, and begin to ask ourselves questions about the policy formation and the direction that we need to take in order to correct or deal with some of the challenges that the data presents.”
Tune in tomorrow as Ag Secretary Vilsack puts the Census of Agriculture results into further perspective.
