How Do Declining Farm Numbers Change American Agriculture?
Farm populations in the United States have been declining for more than half a century. In fact, by the early 1990s Calvin Beale at the USDA had begun to refer to the steady decline in farm populations between 1950 and 1980 as a free fall situation leading us toward trauma. Of course, Americans continue to enjoy a surplus of food and fiber despite these steady declines in farm populations. And many agricultural experts continue to see the attrition of farmers as a necessary market correction insisting that depressed farm economies are due to inefficiencies. In their minds we still have too many farmers. So are declining farm populations leading to trauma or to maximum efficiency? If fewer farmers are able to produce more than enough food and fiber to meet our domestic and export needs, why should we worry about declining farm numbers at all? Many policy makers, and perhaps the general public, are, in fact, not concerned. At a meeting which took place at the National Academy of Sciences
