By Ryan Hanrahan
Pro Farmer’s Spencer Langford reported that “the number of U.S. farms shrank by 15,000 in 2025, bringing the total to 1.865 million, USDA said (last week) in its Land in Farms report.”
“This continues a long-lasting trend of declining farm numbers. Analysis from the American Farm Bureau Federation noted that farm bankruptcies were also on the rise,” Langford reported. “The largest decline at the state-level was Texas, which lost 2,000 operations. No state saw an increase in farms, but multiple states did indicate no change from the prior year.”
In the Midwest, Illinois saw a loss of 400 farms to 69,600, Iowa saw a loss of 500 farms to 86,200, Indiana saw a loss of 500 farms to 51,500, Nebraska saw a loss of 200 farms to 44,100 and Minnesota saw a loss of 1,300 farms to 64,000. Texas remains the state with the highest number of farms, far outpacing all others at 229,000.
“The number of farms decreased in every economic category except for farms making 1 million dollars or more in sales each year, which saw a minor increase of 50 farms. Farms making $1,000-$9,999 in sales posted the largest loss of any category, falling by 8,000,” Langford reported. “The total amount of land in farms came in at 873.95 million acres, a 0.3% decrease from the 2024 figure. Farmland continues to face pressure from economic factors such as urbanization and low or negative returns per acre, particularly in row crops.”
Source : illinois.edu