There are now 3.2 million farmers operating 2.1 million farms on 914.5 million acres of farmland across the United States, according to the 2012 Census of Agriculture, released last Friday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Both sales and production expenses reached record highs in 2012 according to NASS. U.S. producers sold $394.6 billion worth of agricultural products, but it cost them $328.9 billion to produce these products.
Three quarters of all farms had sales of less than $50,000, producing only 3 percent of the total value of farm products sold while those with sales of more than $1 million—4 percent of all farms—produced 66 percent.
Much of the increased farm income was concentrated geographically or by farm categories. California led the nation with nine of the 10 top counties for value of sales. Fresno County was No. 1 in the United States with nearly $5 billion in sales in 2012, which is greater than that of 23 states. Weld County, Colo. ranked 9th in the top 10 U.S. counties.
The top five states for agricultural sales were California ($42.6 billion); Iowa ($30.8 billion); Texas ($25.4 billion); Nebraska ($23.1 billion); and Minnesota ($21.3 billion).
Eighty-seven percent of all U.S. farms are operated by families or individuals. Principal operators were on average, 58.3 years old and were predominantly male; second operators, were slightly younger and most likely to be female; and third operators were younger still.
Young, beginning principal operators who reported their primary occupation as farming increased 11.3 percent from 36,396 to 40,499 between 2007 and 2012.
All categories of minority-operated farms increased between 2007 and 2012; the Hispanic-operated farms had a significant 21 percent increase.
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