USDA: SMALL FAMILY FARMS ACCOUNTED FOR HALF OF FARMLAND BUT ONLY 23% OF PRODUCTION

Feb. 12, 2019 Source: USDA news release

This Chart of Note originally was published April 26, 2018, and is among our Editors' Picks 2018.

In 2016, 99 percent of U.S. farms were family farms, where the principal operator and his or her relatives owned the majority of the business.

Small family farms—those with less than $350,000 in annual gross cash farm income (GCFI)—accounted for about 90 percent of U.S. farms, half of all farmland, and a quarter of the value of production.

By comparison, large-scale family farms—those with $1 million or more in GCFI—made up only 3 percent of U.S. farms and 18 percent of farmland, but contributed 45 percent of production.

Nonfamily farms, such as partnerships of unrelated partners and corporations, accounted for just 1 percent of U.S. farms and 10 percent of production.

The 19 percent of nonfamily farms with GCFI of $1 million or more accounted for 88 percent of all nonfamily farms’ production.

This chart appears in the ERS report America’s Diverse Family Farms: 2017 Edition, released December 2017.