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Most U.S. crop farms are small, but most cropland is on large farms

  • Farm Structure and Organization
  • Farm Economy
A chart showing the size distribution of crop farms in 2011.

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In 2011, 1.68 million U.S. farms had cropland, and their average size was 234 acres, according to data gathered in the annual Agricultural Resource Management Survey (ARMS), USDA’s primary source of farm financial information. Most farms (80 percent) were smaller than the average size in 2011, and the median size—the size at which half of farms are larger and half are smaller—was just 45 acres. On the other hand, most cropland (about 54 percent) was on much larger farms—those with 1,000 acres or more. This chart is found in the ERS report, Farm Size and the Organization of U.S. Crop Farming, ERR-152, August 2013.

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