Disappearing acres: America could lose more than 18M acres of farmland by 2040, according to new report (2024)

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Disappearing acres: America could lose more than 18M acres of farmland by 2040, according to new report? ›

In Runaway Sprawl, the losses could climb to 24.4 million acres, with more than one million acres paved over or compromised every year. However, in the Better Built Cities Plan, policymakers and planners can slash conversion by 55% and save up to 13.5 million acres.

More than 31 million acres of U.S. agricultural land have been irrevocably lost to urban expansion since 1982 and an additional 175 acres of farm and ranchland are lost every hour to make way housing and other industries. The land that is being lost is some of the most productive agricultural land in the country.

In 2021 alone, the US lost 1.3 million acres of farmland. According to the US Department of Agriculture, the total land used for farming decreased from 896.6M acres in 2020 to 895.3M in 2021.

The Farms Under Threat: The State of the States report from American Farmland Trust estimates an average of 2,000 acres of farmland are converted each day.

New study says California's farmland is shrinking due to years-long severe drought - CBS Sacramento.

Disappearing acres: America could lose more than 18M acres of farmland by 2040, according to new report. Farmland sustains life around the country, but it's disappearing as cities grow.

One of the main reasons behind this trend is urbanization. Cities and towns are expanding into previously rural areas. And that often involves the conversion of farmland into residential, commercial or industrial land uses.

The “Yearbook of Agriculture” for 1934 announces, “Approximately 35 million acres of formerly cultivated land have essentially been destroyed for crop production…. 100 million acres now in crops have lost all or most of the topsoil; 125 million acres of land now in crops are rapidly losing topsoil….”

The nation lost more than 100,000 farms between 2011 and 2018; 12,000 of those between 2017 and 2018 alone.

Farms and Land

These farms accounted for 900.2 million acres of land in farms, or 40 percent of all U.S. land.

How much land in the U.S. is abandoned? ›

Nationally, an average 16.7% of large US cities' land area is considered vacant, with approximately 4% of city addresses unoccupied. The ratio of vacant land to city size has increased by 1.3 percentage points since 1998 but decreased by 3 percentage points since 1963.

June 2, 2022 -- By 2050, we will need to produce as much as 56% more food than we did in 2010 to feed the world's growing population. While experts agree we can do it using current farming and production practices, it could be catastrophic for the planet.

ROME (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Generating three centimeters of top soil takes 1,000 years, and if current rates of degradation continue all of the world's top soil could be gone within 60 years, a senior UN official said on Friday.

The US farming base has shrunk 7% in eight years, yet the world population is continuously growing. The number of farms has also declined over the past eight years by an estimated 117,500 farms.

Financial Reasons Owners Sell Farmland

Sometimes a seller just wants to realize their gains in asset appreciation or trade land for cash to invest in another opportunity. For example, a landowner may find a desirable property and want to sell out of one piece of land to invest in the new one.

His analysis found that the number of farms around the world would drop from 616 million in 2020 to 272 million in 2100. A key reason: As a country's economy grows, more people migrate to urban areas, leaving fewer people in rural areas to tend the land.

The availability of arable land. Data source: Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and World Bank. The per capita arable land worldwide was 0.42 hectares in 1960. It will be 0.19 hectares in 2050.

Here is other noteworthy farmland data, courtesy of USDA's Farms and Land in Farms 2022 Summary. 2.003 million: The number of U.S. farms, which is down 9,350 farms from 2021.

The vast majority of Texas land — 83 percent — is part of a farm, ranch or forest. But Texas is losing such rural land more than any other state, in large part because of the exploding growth of metropolitan areas, according to newly released data.

Climate change, the spread of intensive agriculture, deforestation and industrial activity have accelerated the loss of soils in almost every country in the world.

What is the US farm problem? ›

The farm problem in the United States historically has been considered to be one of relatively low farm incomes. This problem can be traced in large measure to the destabilizing effects of economic growth.

Hatfield says urbanization and soil degradation from excessive tillage and other farming practices are largely to blame for lost farm and ranchlands.

Rajasthan tops the chart with 25% of its geographical area being wasteland, accounting for 18% of the wasteland nationally.

Jammu and Kashmir have the maximum area of wasteland in India.

Our lands are disappearing at an alarming rate.

In the United States, we lose roughly 150 acres of natural land and 40 acres of farmland every hour.

The number of U.S. farms continues slow decline

In the most recent survey, there were 2.00 million U.S. farms in 2022, down from 2.20 million in 2007. Similarly, the acres of land in farms continue its downward trend with 893 million acres in 2022, down from 915 million acres ten years earlier.

For example Farm Market jobs pay as much as $17,867 (55.6%) more than the average Farmer salary of $32,133.

Average four-crop gross income per acre = approximately $790 per acre.

People own most farmland. Some 2.6 million owners are individuals or families, and they own more than two thirds of all farm acreage. Fewer than 32,500 non family held corpor ations own farmland, and they own less than 5 percent of all U.S. farmland.

How much property does China own in the US? ›

China owns roughly 384,000 acres of U.S. agricultural land, according to a 2021 report from the Department of Agriculture.

The 2022 Land Report 100, compiled each year by The Land Report magazine, released its annual list of landowners who own the most acres in the United States. The nation's largest private landowners are the Emmerson family in California who own over 2.4 million acres.

During a session on foreign investment in U.S. agriculture at USDA's 99th Annual Agricultural Outlook Forum on Feb. 24, Clayton Michaud, an agricultural economist with USDA, said foreign entities own approximately 40 million acres, which accounts for 3% of all privately held agricultural land in the U.S.

Meat from plants

According to a recent study, plant-based meat alternatives could form a quarter of our 'meat' intake by 2040. Current icons of this new food revolution include Beyond Meat, Quorn, and, in the US, Impossible Foods.

World population too big to feed by 2050

The world population could be too big to feed itself by 2050. By then, there will be almost 10 billion people on the planet and food demand will have increased by 70 percent compared to 2017.

It was a bad year for food shortages in 2022, with categories including eggs and baby formula hit hard. Unfortunately, 2023 could see its own batches of food shortages. Here's what consumers should start stocking up on now before prices soar and products likely become harder to find on store shelves.

Livestock is probably the most common way farmers make money from their land. And while animals have a few more expenses and a higher overhead, they usually bring in top dollar in terms of net income.

Some are eroding quickly: 16% of soils are estimated to have a lifespan of less than 100 years. Others are eroding slowly: half have a lifespan greater than 1000 years; and one-third have over 5000 years.

In 2021, 21.1 million full- and part-time jobs were related to the agricultural and food sectors—10.5 percent of total U.S. employment. Direct on-farm employment accounted for about 2.6 million of these jobs, or 1.3 percent of U.S. employment.

Which US state has the highest percentage of farmland? ›

Texas had the most land in farms in the United States in 2021 followed by Montana and Kansas. Texas accounted for more than 14% of the land in farms in the United States in 2021.

Texas had the most farms in the United States in 2021 followed by Missouri and Iowa.

The potential benefits of no-till are well-documented, from improving soil health to reducing annual fuel and labor investments. Still, continuous no-till has been adopted across only 21 percent of all cultivated cropland acres in the United States. Why?

Currently, investors are attracted to farmland due to its low correlation with the stock market's volatility. This makes it an exceptional tool for diversifying portfolios. Farmers have pricing power for their crops. Food is not a discretionary item on any budget.

Rising input costs, shrinking production values, commodity specialization, and challenges to land access all appear to be connected to declining farm operator livelihoods, the new study in Frontiers of Sustainable Food Systems concludes.

What is the richest most productive farmland of the Earth? Places with the richest soil in the world are Eurasian Steppe; Mesopotamia; from Manitoba, Canada, as far south as Kansas; the central valley of California; Oxnard plain and the Los Angeles basin; Pampas lowlands of Argentina and Uruguay.

Farmers are struggling to keep pace with inflation. Production costs for seed, fertilizer, equipment and other farming essentials are the highest we've seen in decades, subjecting farmers to higher cost of capital required to operate their business.

It is true that in the United States fewer acres are used for agriculture today than in the past, although the loss is far less than what Worldwatch and United States Department of Agriculture report. But this “loss” of farmland is not a crisis or even a cause for concern. Instead, it is good news.

Average Farm Income by State

The states with the best opportunities for farmers had the highest populations in 2021. California tops the list with average salaries at ​$44.03​ per hour, or ​$91,590​ per year.

In the US, small farms accounted for less than one-fourth of food production in 2020, down from nearly half in the 1990s. And the agricultural landscape continues to change, fueled by technology and increased industrialization, resulting in larger and larger farms.

How much farmland in the US is foreign owned? ›

Of the 1.3 billion acres of private agricultural land in the United States, foreign entities fully or partially owned roughly 40 million acres valued at $74 billion in 2021.

Every year, the world loses 12 million hectares of productive land, with far-reaching consequences, including falling crop yields, massive food loss, rising tensions over natural resources, forced migration and weakened resilience to climate change.

Farm and ranch families comprise less than 2% of the U.S. population.

In the most recent survey, there were 2.00 million U.S. farms in 2022, down from 2.20 million in 2007.

The underlying causes of farmland loss in California are rapid population growth and the inefficient use of land. Since 1990, urban development has consumed an acre of land for every 9.4 people statewide. In the San Joaquin Valley, the rate was an acre for every 8 people.

China owns roughly 384,000 acres of U.S. agricultural land, according to a 2021 report from the Department of Agriculture. Of that, 195,000 acres, worth almost $2 billion when purchased, are owned by 85 Chinese investors, which could be individuals, companies or the government.

People own most farmland. Some 2.6 million owners are individuals or families, and they own more than two thirds of all farm acreage. Fewer than 32,500 non family held corpor ations own farmland, and they own less than 5 percent of all U.S. farmland. Farmland owners hold an aver age of about 280 acres each.

The United States farm real estate value, a measurement of the value of all land and buildings on farms, averaged $3,800 per acre for 2022, up $420 per acre (12.4 percent) from 2021. The United States cropland value averaged $5,050 per acre, an increase of $630 per acre (14.3 percent) from the previous year.

At a recent conference, the U.N.'s Food and Agricultural Organization warned that if soil erosion continues at its current pace, the world could run out of topsoil in 60 years. “Soils are the basis of life,” said Maria-Helena Semedo, the Food and Agriculture Organization's deputy director general of natural resources.

The Link Between Agriculture and Climate Change

However, the agriculture sector also emits greenhouse gases into the atmosphere that contribute to climate change. Read more about greenhouse gas emissions on the Basics of Climate Change page.