Farm Bureau statistic

[Tom]

The proportion of farmers age 55 and over rose from 37 percent in 1954 to 61 percent in 1997.

It's a statistic that came from the census, I think.

[SwampDonkey]

Farming has become a very expensive business. If you want to support a family now a days, it costs at least several hundred thousand to purchase the land and buildings. Most farms of 400-500 acres of tillable land, buildings and support equipment cost $1.5M in these parts for starts. Of course there are programs to get into it. The biggest one here is the new entrant program, but it's mostly immigrants who can take advantage. If your son wants to, he has to go to college first, even though you his dad, like dads before, passed on a lot of knowledge that none of these programs will give credit to. It's a good idea to get the college, nothing wrong there. But, I have not seen where that college graduate has been all that more successful at farming. The numbers I see don't look good at increasing the odds. A lot of our dads farmed 40-50 years with grade 8 or 10 schooling, many had to because there dad became ill and it was carry on or loose the farm.  ;)

[Chris Burchfield]

Farming in the U.S. is much more technical now then it was when my dad was young. My dad plowed a mule for 50¢ a day. Tractors today, governed by on board computer and GPS which are mated, distribute what the soil in that acre needs to reach maximum yield of a given crop. I couldn't keep the coons out my watermelon patch. The deer ate up my pink eyed purple hull peas. Cut worms were relentless on my tomatoes. Mother nature dried up my corn before it made. I'm just thankful for the real farmers that over come these obstacles and provide to the grocery stores. 8)

[stonebroke]

So at 56 I guess I am still a young farmer.

Stonebroke

[fishpharmer]

I would think the average age of farmers is even higher today then 1997.

Farming is about the only business where all the inputs and equipment are purchased at retail prices and all the products are sold at wholesale prices.  Now that I think of it, that sounds like logging.

There are too many unknown risks in farming to suit most folks.  The long hours and labor don't suite most either.  I think a person really has to have a love of farming to be successful at it.  Probably applies to anything for that matter. Although, love of it does not guarantee success since so much is beyond a farmers control. Fewer and fewer folks want the responsibility of being tied to a farm, like any business good reliable help is difficult to find.  Seems like when the smaller farmers die off, the place is bought up by a bigger farmer.  So the big farmers get bigger and the small farmer families rarely if ever get back into farming.  Also, as profit margins decrease a farmer needs more land to have the same lifestyle. 

Well that's my $00.02.  Are others seeing the same thing in other parts of the country?

[Dave Shepard]

Just add ten years to the average farmers age for each census. Probably the same farmers from the 1954 census are the ones still farming today. ;)

[red oaks lumber]

 if we all had a faimly member that would spend thousands if not hundreds of thousand of dollars gambling we would want to get them into treatment asap right? well thats what farmers do every year when planting season comes, no gaurentees of a crop. farming is the only buisness where when you sell a crop or livestock you wait at your mailbox to see what you got paid. young farmers know the hill to start farming is just to steep, if  prices were to rise where they really should for a farmer to make a living doing it . the american people would throw such a fuss demanding to have cheaper food, or our great and always smart goverment would start to import farm products why? because it would be cheaper. if you asked people where food comes from, the large % would say "the store"
the farmer as we know it today is headed for the same fate as the small country school house!
from a disguntled ex- dairy farmer, turned sawmill owner, the only thing that changed is the smell, still long hours,  danG pay, hard work but.... i love it

[stonebroke]

Well the rest of the you people ought to be thankful there are still people crazy enough to want to farm.

Stonebroke

[jim king]

I cannot count the times I have been sitting somewhere in the world wondering why I am getting shot at, trying to die from Malaria or Denge and did not stay at home on the familly farm.

It was a great lifestyle even if it was morning to night seven days a week.  All the relatives would go home to the village after a family gathering and we would go to the barn and milk those cows.  It never ended.

I still miss it.

[Patty]

I absolutely love living on the farm and participating in the day to day operation. Yes it is a wonderful life. Too bad I have to have a day job to support my farm "habit". :(  For a moment we had a glimmer of what a profitable year in farming was......a couple years ago we saw $5 ++ corn and $11 ++ beans. You could see hope in the neighbors eyes when we spoke. We dreamed of fueling our country as well as feeding it with thoughts of biodiesel and ethanol being created right here in the country. That hope lasted one year. We are back to $3 ++ corn and $9 ++ beans, where there is no hope of making a living, much less a real profit. In my area those who farm either own the land or the equipment, very few can afford both, unless they inherited them both from family.

We will stay on our little farm as long as we both are alive, enjoying all the wonder of farm life. It is sad that so few ever have the opportunity to experience life on the farm. I think that is part of the reason we have such kooks trying to implement ridiculous rules upon us. The PETA folks, the ELF folks, the vegans, sierra club, EPA, etc etc. They do not know nature and they have even less knowledge of how to interact with nature.It is pathetic at beast, dangerous at worst if we continue to give them credence.

[Frickman]

Tom's numbers came from the census and I'm not going to argue them or him. One thing that folks don't look at is in many surveys only the farm landowners are surveyed, and they put down their age at whatever they age they are. But the kicker is they are not the ones working and managing the farm. They're renting it to or otherwise have a son, daughter, nephew, or some neighbor actually working the farm. The son is say 35 and making a living on the farm but they count his 60 year old father who owns the land as the farmer. Dad may help out a little at harvest still so he still calls himself a farmer. He is, no question about it. But he is not the primary owner/manager of the operation itself. His son is but he is not counted. Where these surveys sometimes screw up is they automatically assume the property owner is the farmer, but that is not always so.

[Don_Papenburg]

I see a flaw in that Frickman.  If you are 35 and on your own but farming you will fill out the census form as occupation :farmer  On the other hand many farmers were like my dad who though officaly retired he had a small amount of farmland that he acually operated .  We would help him and he would lend us a hand as needed.  So we were all counted

[Ron Wenrich]

I just ran across this statistic in today's paper.  In 1959, there were 4.1 million farms, today there's 2.2 million.  40% of the farmers are 55 or older.

It was a short blurb about getting more people into farming and having it be profitable.  They were aiming it more at small lot farming and growing mainly farmer's market type of produce.  There seems to be a higher market value for these products than something like grain.

There's a new farmer's market that opened close to my home.  We have one in town, but its nothing more than a glorified food court, and what they do sell is high priced.  The new one has low prices and high quality produce.  The cheese counter (where I hang out) has grass fed beef, whole milk from grass fed cows, and cheese made from that milk.  Price is a little higher than the norm, but the quality and flavor is head and shoulders over what you buy in the stores. 

So, I'll have to ask you farmers out there if you think there is an economic advantage to the consumer market or the organic market as compared to the more traditional lines of meat and dairy farming?

[Norm]

Grass fed beef is tricky to do since it's hard to find grass around here this time of year but hay feed beef doesn't have the same ring to it.  :D

The added expense in marketing to the organic crowd makes up for the profit. It can be done on a small scale but ramping up for commercial use is usually not practical. I'm always suspect of the organic claims of the big retailers such as walmart. I know of not one big producer that is growing on that size of scale around here to be able to sell to them.

[stonebroke]

In NYS I do not see how any commodity farmer does it, when the cost of doing business is so high. Part of the premium we get is also local and the remainder is because it is better. The large packers gave up on quality a long time ago. They make their money on volume, so the more the better for them. The small local farmer operates on the fact that some people want quality and are willing to pay for it.It also helps when you have 150 million people within driving distance of your farm.

Stonebroke

[SwampDonkey]

I know one outfit that labels organic and they were buying their wheat from dad and one other farmer, mostly from dad. Dad and the other farmer that supplied them were not organic growers, nor professed to be. The truth is, I never saw an organic wheat field and the old farmer down the road that never used any inputs except manure would produce oats with 1 or 2 kernels per stalk and about 12" tall. :D

A couple local small growers of organic weren't doing it for a living. Both husband and wife work union jobs. Next door is organic, but they have a large support group and other family members work to support the operation. Because you can't live off $0.20/lb carrots year round on 1 acre. They also grow buckwheat, but that is also very small acreage, maybe 30 acres. Green house grows beats and lettuce starting in March, and that isn't profitable either when you burn up 30 cords of firewood that you buy at $220/cord.

[DR Buck]

The census fails to account for "part-time" farmers.  Those like me that have primary income off the farm.  My census list my occupation as an engineer in the aerospace industry, not farmer.   In the big scheme of things, my small beef herd is not even close to the full-time operations that run hundreds or thousands of head.   But there is a lot of others out there that are my size and contribute to the Ag market and food chain.  

BTW - I do fall into the 61%   ;)

[Tom]

I'm growing organic pine trees.  :-\
'Course, only us tree farmers consider ourselves farmers. 

[Gary_C]

So, I'll have to ask you farmers out there if you think there is an economic advantage to the consumer market or the organic market as compared to the more traditional lines of meat and dairy farming?

Yes, there can be a large premium for organic food from the farmer and even good prices for the locally sold produce, organic grown or not. However a lot of people prefer the convenience of the supermarket to the better quality of locally grown or organic. But there are some people that will pay any price to get food that is perceived as safe.

The problem most people have with buying beef locally is buying in such large quantities. 

[jim king]

Down here what is grown is organic as they have no idea what fertilizer is yet.  Maybe the new marketing program for Amazonian products should be  " Organic slash and burn produced food".   That could give the yuppies a whole new outlook on deforestation.

We do have toxic levels of aluminum in the soils so I don´t  know how much of that ends up in the bananas and yuca here and`passed on to the brain cells.  .

Am I a second tier vegetarian when I only eat meat from vegetarian animals ?¿  ??? ???

[Magicman]

I put this in the "Chicken" thread, but it fits here also:

I had a guy come to me wanting to buy lumber to build a home, because he considered my lumber environmentally friendly and "green" qualified.

[Dave Shepard]

Ron W. I know a little bit about the organic milk market. I do some trucking for a guy that sells his milk to an organic outfit. It was great when organic milk market was growing 25% per year, now it's dropping like a rock. They want to get out of their contract, and put him on a monthly contract. Marketing directly to the consumer has some advantages, but puts you in a much different position. You now have to deal with supply and demand, marketing and keeping abreast of regulations. Selling to the middleman, they'll give you nothing for your milk, and take all you can make. Like it or not, that's better than the fair weather friends that the organic markets are.

I'd like to think that it will become more economically feasible to buy locally grown products. From milk, to lettuce, to timber. The more I research how food is handled on a grand scale, the more I want to never eat anything that I don't know how it was produced. Do you know why soda is sweet? Because the sugar hides the salt that makes you thirsty. Yeah, I trust big business like a fox in the hen house.

[Don_Papenburg]

That is funny , I remember in high school  the teacher that was in charge of the consession stand at the games  would always be telling us to use more salt   salt is cheap use more salt on that popcorn . We need to sell pop that is where the money is made .  He was also our marketing teacher. ;D