Page 101 - Farm Bill Series_The 7 Things You Should Know

By Sara Wyant

WASHINGTON, March 19, 2017 – U.S. farmers are getting grayer, their national numbers are
on the decline and fewer young people are moving back to farms and ranches. The average age
of a principal operator of a U.S. farm is now over 58 years old.

Absent opportunities for
manufacturing, recreation or other
industries, many of their surrounding
small towns are dying off, too. It’s a
vicious depopulation cycle in some
areas: Young people move out for job
opportunities and don’t ever move
back, schools consolidate, basic
services start to crumble, and the tax
base erodes.

The rural population in 2015 stood at
46.2 million – just 14 percent of the
U.S. population on 72 percent of the
land mass. That represents a decline
of 136,000 people between 2010 and
2014, according to USDA’s

Economic Research Service. The number of principal operators
on farms has been dropping, too – from 2.2 million in 2007 to
2.1 million in 2012.

Is rural America destined to decline? Some say the answer is
“no,” but will also argue that attitudes will have to change.

“It’s been very difficult to get people in rural America to
believe – particularly within the agriculture production
community – that this is not a zero-sum game,” notes Tom
Dorr, an Iowa farmer and former USDA under secretary for
Rural Development. Former USDA Under Secretary
Tom Dorr

www.Agri-Pulse.com 99