Pretty much anyone who works in agriculture can tell you that most farms are not “factory farms” and that term is found to be horribly offensive, especially to people who raise livestock. The implication being made is that just because a farm is big, it’s bad, which isn’t at all the case!
The U.S. Department of Agriculture collects information on farms in the U.S., and there are a few terms that we may know already that are defined by the USDA. These definitions help us understand how the USDA collects data.
The USDA defines a farm a place that, during a given year, produced or sold (or normally would have produced or sold) a minimum of $1,000 of agricultural products. The USDA uses acres of crops and head of livestock to determine whether a farm or ranch that has sales of less than $1,000 could normally produce and sell at least $1,000 of agricultural product and could then be categorized as a farm.
A family farm is defined as a farm where the majority of the business is owned by an operator and/or any individual related by blood, marriage, or adoption, including relatives who don’t live in the operator’s household. Non-family farms are any farms where any operator and any individuals related to them don’t own a majority of the business.
To determine farm size, the USDA looks at gross cash farm income (GCFI). This is a measure of the farm’s revenue that includes sales of crops and livestock, government payments, other farm-related income, and fees that operators receive from production contracts. Small farms have a GCFI of less than $350,000, mid-sized farms have a GCFI between $350,000 and $999,999, and large farms have a GCFI of $1,000,000 or more.
One thing you’ll notice is that there is no definition of “factory farm.” This is because the term “factory farm” has been created by animal-rights activist groups that want you to think negatively of agriculture. The goal of saying “factory farm” is to make you think of huge farms whose only goal is to produce as many animals as fast as possible without any considerations for animal welfare or the environment. If you search “What is a factory farm?” on a simple Google search, almost every result is from animal-rights extremist groups that claim things like “factory farms” are “industrial operations” whose goal is to “maximize profits using as few resources as possible.”
They also claim things like factory farms represent “99 percent of agriculture.” This simply is not true.
The term “factory farm” often gets muddled with a “CAFO.” CAFO stands for concentrated animal feeding operation. Similarly, an AFO (animal feeding operation) is a farm that has any number of agricultural animals that are tended to and fed in a confined space (defined as a place without growing vegetation) for 45 days or more throughout the year. A CAFO, just like farms, can be designated as small, medium, or large. A large CAFO is considered to be any AFO with more than 1,000 animal units — with an “animal unit” defined as 1,000 pounds of live weight. You need a million or more pounds worth of livestock to be considered a large CAFO. This is interesting because a dairy farm only needs 700 cows to be considered a CAFO, but a turkey farmer needs 55,000 birds.
CAFO is not a new term: It was created by the EPA in 1976. While all CAFO means is a certain size of an animal operation, over time it’s been taken over by animal-rights groups that use it interchangeably with “factory farm.” Critics of CAFOs claim that they can cause pollution, have poor animal care, and that most or all CAFOs are owned by corporations. In reality, CAFOs are efficient at feeding and housing animals, tend to be more technologically advanced due to the larger facility size, and are subject to inspections and regulations surrounding animal welfare and the environment. And yes, lots of CAFOs are family farms, not part of some detached corporate entity.
The next time you hear CAFO, don’t think of it as another term for “factory farm,” instead, it’s just a way to define a certain size of farm.
Now it’s time to dive into the numbers to really drive the point home. In 2022, non-family farms only made up 2.7 percent of all farms in the U.S. These non-family farms tend to vary greatly in size, income, and ownership structure. This means that over 97 percent of all farms in the U.S. are family owned and operated. Family farms make up 90 percent of total agricultural production. Eighty-eight percent of farms are small family-owned and -operated farms. And 5.8 percent of farms are classified as mid-size, with just 3 percent of farms considered large.
Large-scale farms (obviously) tend to be larger and take more land than small farms. In 2022, large-scale family farms accounted for 52 percent of the total value of production and 25 percent of agricultural land.
Farming is still an overwhelmingly family business.
Most farms are owned and operated by families. These people are your neighbors, friends, and people in your community. Very few farms are owned by large corporations, but even so, these farms are operated by your friends and community members. But every farm, no matter the size or who owns it, has the same values. The goal is to provide safe, nutritious food at a reasonable price, all while providing good care to animals and the environment.
Michelle Miller, the Farm Babe, is a farmer, public speaker, and writer who has worked for years with row crops, beef cattle, and sheep. She believes education is key in bridging the gap between farmers and consumers.
