Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Average Farm Size
hectares
0
50
0 km
65 - 250
250 - 500
500 - 885
885 - 1,500
1,500 - 2,000
2,000 or more
Method: Quartic Kernel density
smoothing in a flexible bandwidth
of the 30 nearest counties
Source: US Agricultural census
Designed and made by JM Zaninetti, University of Orleans, CEDETE Institute
Figure 2.3.
Average farm size in 2002
Farms in the US are vast. The average farm cultivates 885 hectares (ha), and
sizes range from 170 ha in Rhode Island, to 5,600 ha in Montana (see Figure 2.3).
The increase in farm size from east to west primarily reflects the history of
settlements, but also the influence of an environment which becomes more and more
challenging moving west. Farms have to be vast in order to be able to be cost-
effective in the more mountainous and arid regions of the West. Farm sizes get
smaller once again in the fertile valleys of the Pacific coast.
Farms are exceedingly large in the northwestern Great Plains (Nebraska, South
Dakota, Montana, Wyoming) because of drought and agricultural decline. Yet, the
biggest farms of all are found in the arid regions of western Texas. Apart from a few
isolated areas of the Appalachians dedicated to subsistence farming, the small family
farm no longer dominates in the US, with one exception: the Pacific Northwest
(Willamette Valley).
