The USDA has released the results of the 2022 Census of Agriculture and it shows a continued decrease in the number of U.S. farming operations.
“I’m concerned about the state of agriculture and food production in this country,” Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack said Tuesday.
Vilsack says the decline is significant. “In 2017 when we did this survey, there were 2,042,220 farms,” he said. “Today, the survey reports we have 1.9 million farms.
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Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack visited Minnesota this week to highlight USDA’s Rural Energy for America Program.
Governor Tim Walz accompanied Vilsack during a stop to a farm near St. Charles in the southeastern part of the state and tells Brownfield REAP is creating value-added opportunities.
“We were at a farm that put up a wind turbine, and they talked about REAP helping them on the front end and how they got a return on the investment and started to see a profit after two years.”
He says Minnesota leads the country in REAP grant recipients.
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The March 1st, 2024 hog inventory was up modestly on the year.
The USDA says the U.S. hog and pig inventory was 74.571 million head, 2% lower than on December 1st, 2023, but 1% higher than March 1st, 2023, a little bit larger than analysts’ expectations.
That year-to-year increase can be tied to a larger pig crop, and a record number of pigs saved per litter for the quarter spanning December 2023 to February 2024, despite a decline in the number of sows farrowed, reflecting the efficiency of producers.
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The USDA expects farmers to plant fewer acres of corn and more acres of soybeans in 2024.
Corn planted area is projected at 90.036 million acres, at the low end of pre-report guesses and 5% less than 2023, with acreage steady to lower in 38 of the 48 states used in the estimation.
That includes potentially the lowest expected planted area in Iowa since 2006.
Soybean planted area is seen at 86.51 million acres, higher than the average estimate and 3% above a year ago, with acreage steady to higher in 24 of the 29 states used for the calculation.
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U.S. ethanol stocks hit a more than one-year high last week.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration says the domestic supply of 26.092 million barrels was a 53-week high, up 83,000 on the week and 565,000 on the year, with the Midwest stockpile at its second largest weekly total on record.
That build is partially due to demand not rising to the level of production.
The Renewable Fuels Association says net inputs of ethanol purchased by refiners and blenders and the volume of gasoline supplied to the market were both down from the previous week.
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The director of the Soy Transportation Coalition warns the U.S. agricultural supply chain could feel ripple effects from the Baltimore bridge collapse.
Mike Steenhoek tells Brownfield ocean vessels like the one that struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge early Tuesday typically make multiple stops.
“So the impacts of this is not just going be confined to Baltimore, obviously that’s ground zero. That’s where the problem will be most acutely felt, but it’s also going to have an impact on these other port regions.”
He says those include Norfolk, Virginia and Savannah, Georgia.
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