Local farmers older, working on more valuable land
Posted: February 18, 2010 at 2:41 p.m.
LITTLE ROCK — Arkansas farmers are harvesting more corn and rice and producing more chickens, and doing it all on increasingly valuable land. And a majority of them now consider farming their secondary occupation — a sideline, even if they find it necessary to make ends meet.
The just-released 2007 Census of Agriculture for Arkansas shows that the number of Arkansans who consider farming their primary occupation was down from 27,411 to 21,960 since 2002. But the number who considered it a secondary occupation jumped from 20,072 to 27,386 — essentially flipping.
Patrick Boyle in the Arkansas field office of the USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service, said many mid-range farmers are leaving the business if they can’t expand. As he put it, “They’re getting bigger or they’re getting out.”
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