Middle Sized Farms

Small farms and big corporate farms are staying relatively steady, but middle sized farms may be phasing out. I asked that question to Randy Dickhut, senior vice president of real estate operations for Farmers National.

That's what the numbers show. Looking at that USDA survey, that was 2017. That's data. That is true. And you have to peel it apart to really see what's going on, because one, that smaller farmer, smaller farms that sells, gosh, ten thousand dollars worth of ag products, or maybe it's even less than that. So that's growing because you've got hobby farms, you've got anybody with an acreage selling some produce, a farmer's market and such, which is great. But then on the larger size, it's just the natural consolidation that's been going on as either farmed more acres or have more livestock in a, quote, farm which takes in from individuals to corporate livestock farms and whatever. And those in the middle where they're not grossing enough revenue. One hundred thousand dollars. Two hundred thousand dollars. They're not properly full time farmers. And so you've got retirements who decided to quit or they're just deciding that not go farm anymore. So their numbers are shrinking a little bit. It's kind of a continuation of the trend we've seen over the last decade or so and with trade wars maybe even speeding up.