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Agriculture report shows fewer but larger farms in US

Agriculture report shows fewer but larger farms in US
5 years 8 months 3 days ago Thursday, April 11 2019 Apr 11, 2019 April 11, 2019 2:45 PM April 11, 2019 in News - AP Texas Headlines

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) - The latest Census of Agriculture shows the number of farms and ranches in the U.S. has fallen but the remaining operations are larger and are responsible for a higher percentage of agricultural sales.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture released the 2017 Census of Agriculture on Thursday, marking the 29th release of the report since the government began collecting the data in 1840. Since 1982, it has been released every five years.

The census shows there were 2.04 million farms and ranches in 2017, down 3.2 percent from 2012. The average size of those operations was 441 acres, an increase of 1.6 percent.

About 75 percent of all sales came from only 105,453 of those farms, down more than 14,000 from 2012.

The average age of producers was 57.5.

Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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