Doris J. Newton

Working the Land with 10 Acres: Small Acreage Farming in the United States Doris J. Newton

Roughly 13 percent of U. S. farms (294,000) operated on 10 acres or less in 2007, and while most of these small acreage (SA) farms generated very little, if any, farm production, some managed to attain sizeable sales despite their limited land base. Given strong and growing empirical evidence that larger farms are more efficient at producing most farm products, what factors account for the apparent continuing financial viability of some small acreage farms? This report looks at small acreage farms having gross sales of $10,000 or more in a given year to better understand the product choices and strategies used by small acreage farms that appear to be operating profitably.