Craving for ‘locally grown’ keeps farms profitable
A federal census shows Connecticut farmers’ income surged from 2017-22, but production costs remain high.
Released this month, the figures from the U.S. Department of Agriculture list the average farm in Connecticut at 74 acres, a 7 percent increase from 2017, but farming acreage decreased in the same period by 2.5% to 372,000 acres. The number of farms declined to 5,058, but net income per farm increased by 90% from $14,941 in 2017 to $28,428 five years later, the USDA reported.
The boost was due in part to the growing popularity of locally grown farm products, what UConn professor Rigoberto Lopez called “a renaissance in food” that rose during the COVID-19 pandemic. Connecticut farmers also have been working on efficiencies in the face of some of the nation’s highest production costs, Lopez, of UConn’s Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, said Tuesday.
Connecticut farmers face higher prices for fuel, electricity, fertilizer, transportation, real estate, and other costs, Lopez and Joan Nichols, executive director of the Connecticut Farm Bureau Association, said. The nonprofit advocacy organization serves about 2,000 farmers.
Nichols and Lopez both stressed the importance of farm diversification. The most recent figures show over 200 Connecticut farms, for example, reported annual average revenue of $66,000 from agri-tourism, Nichols noted.
“The marketplace is there,” she said. “It’s how to stay on top of the profitability that’s the challenge.”
“A lot of consumers want to support local farmers, and that connection has to be cultivated,” Lopez said.
The state’s farmers have an advantage in serving the sprawling and wealthy New York City area market, he said. For the census period, the USDA reported the total value of Connecticut’s agricultural products was $704 million, an increase of 21%, with nursery, greenhouse, floriculture, and sod totaling $362 million, or 51% of the total sales. That increase, however, was set off by a similar rise in inflation over the same period, Lopez said.
“The size of the pie stayed about the same,” he said, “but no news is good news. It could have been worse.”
Other highlights from the census report include:
Connecticut farms included 139,000 acres of cropland in 2022, with 85% harvested.
Farms with internet access rose from 81% to 85.8%.
Connecticut ranked fifth nationally in tobacco production; 12th in cultivated Christmas trees; 18th in nursery, greenhouse, floriculture and sod; and 21st in aquaculture. Tobacco production in the state, which has focused on shade tobacco for cigar wrappers, has declined, in part due to competition from the Dominican Republic and other
countries, Lopez said. He added, however, “Connecticut still makes some of the finest tobacco leaves in the world — there’s no question about it.”
Litchfield County had the most farms (1,005) and the most land in farms, 85,205 acres. Since 1974, the Census of Agriculture has defined a farm as “any place from which $1,000 or more of agricultural products were produced and sold, or normally would have been sold, during the census year.” The USDA census shows smaller farms in Connecticut, those with $10,000 or less in annual sales, have declined in number while larger farms have grown, and that appears to be a trend, Lopez said. Nichols said some farmers, particularly in dairy and nursery/ greenhouse, have consolidated in the past several years.
A total of 872 Connecticut farms used renewable
energy producing systems compared to 666 farms in 2017, a 24% increase. Most farms (93%) with renewable energy systems reported using solar panels. Still, production costs increased by about 16% during the census period.
The average age of all Connecticut farm producers was 58.5, up from 57.1 in 2017. The number of new and beginning farmers increased 3% since 2017. The number of producers
under age 35 was 956, comprising 10% of all producers, slightly ahead of the national average of 9%.
In 2022, there were 3,854 female producers, accounting for 41% of all Connecticut producers.
Due to COVID relief programs, government payments to state farmers increased from $1.85 million in 2017 to about $14.4 million in 2022.
“The results of the 2022 Census of Agriculture show that Connecticut is following many of the national trends, including the decline in number of farms, however our state is ahead of the national average for both female and new and beginning producers,” Connecticut Agriculture Commissioner Bryan Hurlburt said.
Dairy farmers in Connecticut are struggling, but the dairy industry contributes $2.2 billion to Connecticut’s economy and employs about 5,000 people who feed, milk, and clean up after 18,500 Holsteins, Brown Swiss, Jerseys, Linebacks, and other breeds that produce 430 million pounds (one gallon weighs 8.6 pounds) of milk each year.
Aquaculture in the state, Lopez said, holds promise, but has been affected by competition from farms with cheaper production costs, the same challenge that tobacco farmers have faced. All Connecticut farmers, Lopez noted, have had to endure climate change shocks of drought and flooding over the past three years. Their survival, he said, “shows that agriculture is resilient, and that is the good news.”