Working the Land With 10 Acres: Small Acreage Farming in the United States

Doris Newton

No 168380, Economic Information Bulletin from United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service

Abstract: According to the U.S. Census of Agriculture, 294,000 farms operated on 10 or fewer acres in 2007. While most small acreage (SA) operations did very little farming, approximately 50,000 SA farms had gross sales of $10,000 or more in 2007; 3,600 reported grossing $500,000 or more. Thus, a limited land base does not necessarily translate into low sales. This report focuses on SA farms, especially those grossing $10,000 or more in a given year, and examines such characteristics as production strategies, types of products, sales, household income, and financial performance. The 46,000 SA farms with sales between $10,000 and $500,000 in 2007 were primarily active in floriculture, tree nurseries, and fruits and vegetables, while the 3,600 SA farms with at least $500,000 in sales were primarily active in confined livestock production. SA farms produce only small amounts of field crops, such as wheat, corn, or cotton, which require larger amounts of land.

Keywords: Agribusiness; Agricultural and Food Policy; Agricultural Finance; Farm Management; Livestock Production/Industries; Production Economics; Teaching/Communication/Extension/Profession (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 31
Date: 2014-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/168380/files/EIB123.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:uersib:168380

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.168380

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Economic Information Bulletin from United States Department of Agriculture, Economic Research Service Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by AgEcon Search ().