Only 2 percent of farmers support 98 percent of Americans.

98 percent of Americans Depend on 2 percent who are Farmers

Today in the United States, fewer than 1 percent claim farming as an occupation, and only 2 percent of Americans live on a farm. In my opinion, this translates to a systemic risk for the 98 percent of people who literally depend on them for their food.

It looks even worse from the following perspective.. Farmers and ranchers themselves make up just 1.3% of the employed US population, totaling around 2.6 million people. That’s just 0.8% of the U.S. population as of this post.

There are various ways to slice this pie. Total ‘agricultural’ related employment numbers don’t look quite as scary, but still… “Agriculture and its related industries provide 10.5 percent of U.S. employment” according to the USDA.

From the standpoint of what I consider to be systemic risk, I’m concerned about the extremely low number of American family farms compared to years past.

According to data from the USDA, 70% of the American work force worked in agriculture in the year 1840. Whereas in the year 2000, barely 2% worked strictly in agriculture.

Fewer Small Farms and Workforce

What has changed? Well, lots of things.

Technology has enabled scale of efficiencies in farming.

Big farms and corporate farming have swallowed up a tremendous number of small, medium, and family farms – for a number of reasons.

Burdening regulations that only ‘big money’ could deal with, which resulted in many farmers having to sell or face bankruptcy. (It’s not exactly a high margin industry).

Most remaining family farmers are what you might consider to be the older generation. There’s little interest among the young who may find better financial opportunities elsewhere. In America today, the average principal farm operator is 58 years old, nearing the age of retirement. 

Food Supply in the Hands of the Few

Whatever the many additional reasons are, the fact is that much our food supply is in the hands of the few – most of whom are ‘big farming’ and/or part of ‘big corporate agriculture’. And they do not necessarily have your best interests in mind.

Don’t get me wrong.. they’re producing lots of ‘food’ (and exports). However the way I see it – this has put most of our eggs in one basket, so to speak.

From the standpoint of prepping & preparedness, I see all this as a fairly significant risk. The risks associated with big-farming / corporate profits versus things like nutrition, sustainability, ‘real food’ (just to name a few).. And think about the great distances involved from farm to table (and the things they have to do (e.g. modifying foods) to overcome this).

Putting the majority power and control of our food supply into ‘big money’, ‘big agriculture’ seems a bit risky to me. In America, the big get bigger and the small go out.

And what about the fact that we’re ‘hooked’ on this system? The family farms are almost essentially gone. As more small farmers give up or give in, there’s quite an impact on rural communities and supporting infrastructure. Much to the glee of big agriculture.

Side note: Did you know that Bill Gates is now apparently the biggest owner of farmland in the United States?

What You Can Do About It

Support local farming. Don’t gripe about the price at a Farmers Market – they have to eat too. Grow your own garden, however big or small. Help out a farmer if you are able. Support community farming / gardening.

Sometimes (within the prepping & preparedness arena) we might hypothesize what would happen under one of many ‘worst case disaster scenarios’. Well, the food department ought to be one of your major priorities. It’s one thing to have plenty stored away. But what about when it runs out and supply chains are essentially non-existent? It will take a functioning community focused on sustainability to overcome. The more small farms around – the better..

[ Read (and video) Paul Harvey ‘So God Made A Farmer’ Speech ]

[ Read: No City Can Feed It’s Own People ]

9 Meals Away From Chaos

24 Comments

  1. If the general population knew that mrna junk is going in to chickens, beef and as far as I know already in pork those that are able would be raising their own.

    This along with mrna being put into and grown in plants that will be some time in the future up for consumption.

    The people doing it are not promoting it, as letting the public know.
    Another state’s beef farmers/ranchers voted against letting the public know the beef they produce will have mrna in it.

  2. Getting injected with mRNA is one thing. Eating something, which was injected with some sort of mRNA serum, is another.

    Do you think cooking and eating meat from an animal, which received an mRNA serum is dangerous? You think the mRNA the animal received is going to somehow infect you? How?

    Remember. The mRNA active elements are extremely vulnerable to heat, let alone able to be viable after it is exposed to your digestive acids, should you eat some uncooked meat.

    Do we need to worry about a raw pork roast “shedding” spike-proteins? I don’t think so.

  3. Horse and Ison
    Dont forget that at least 2/3 if not more of the population is and was all on board with getting that MRNA jab. They are also total sheep

  4. The population mostly has no regard for nor respect for farmers and ranchers.
    I say let them eat eachother.
    Who is John Galt!

  5. Good “Food for Thought” article Ken.
    As someone who has an interest in preparing for TSHTF type thing, why do y’all think Food is right up there at the top of the list?
    CAUSE IF TSHTF There won’t be ANY good old Wally World to get your junk food from……

    With everything that’s going on over the past ohhhhhh let’s say 10 years do YOU fell all warm and fuzzy about the condition of the world???

    I would add to Ken’s article you had better know how to preserve food for long term storage. That Garden may produce for 6, 7, 8 months, than what???? You know how to hunt, dress, process. And effectively store a deer. Or an Elk IF your lucky enough to find one walking down Main Street in your city.
    On the other hand, we all could be wrong and good Ole Bill Gates will feed us all for free because we all bought one of his computers….. right?

    1. NRP & Blue
      I can skin a deer and run a trout line, forge the wild, grow almost any thing, and preserve it. I have the tools and the knowledge.

      THIS REDNECK COUNTRY HICK WILL SURVIVE.

      1. Stand my Ground:
        I’zzzz been a Redneck for a long, very long time, AND I still got all me tooths…. NADA wrong with being a “Redneck” fer sure 🤪

  6. The problem I see, with what is considered a family farm, has been specialized into raising only 1-3 different crops. In my case only corn and soybeans. Different crops would require more crop specific machinery and an elevator willing to take that crop, or a dedicated grain bin for it, then trucks to haul it to the buyer. It’s kinda like giving a mouse a cookie. So it’s gotten to the point that even farmers can’t really feed themselves without bartering their goods to the neighbors. Although I guess we’re closer to the start of the food chain than most.
    As to the retirement age, we are getting closer, but the only place farmers retire to is the cemetery. Mine would be miserable any other way.

    1. Big difference between growing commodities and growing food.
      This is a distinction most people dont understand.
      I can picture city peeps rushing out to the country to accost some poor farmer for food only to find that he grows safflower for oil.
      Oh what fun,
      They wont see the edamame through all the soybeans

      1. Kula, I think the people who live out in the country might have a thing or two to say about city folk rushing out to the country. Don’t you remember what happened on a curtain bridge that crossed from New Orleans to another Parish in Louisiana? The people in that Parish told the people trying to cross to turn back, there was nothing for them there, and those that didn’t well, they were eventually carried away.

  7. People think of farmers as growing a little bit of everything. Mostly, in my experience, they don’t. My family has been farming wheat for three generations. My grandparents farmed during the depression and did have livestock, poultry, and a garden. Fish in the stock tank. That was all for their own use. They bought flour with proceeds from the wheat. My uncle took over the wheat farm. They had beef, poultry, a big garden, and fruit trees for their own use. My cousin took over the wheat farm. They live in town and have a small garden and run a catering service as well as the wheat farming. The truck gardeners that sell at the farmers market here are few in number. The state heavily regulates even small agriculture so it’s not worth it for me to participate. But quite a few of us can together, share our excess, and help each other out. It’s really the communities we build that will sustain us. Dark days are coming.

  8. AnonyMee
    That same sort of regulation of small farms by government is precisely why i stoped growing for market. I refuse to be told how to run my farm and business by some prick from the state who has a degree and never ran a business nor grew a crop for market.
    So yea,
    Again
    Who is John Galt!
    I have 8 acres of prime upcountry farm land that has been sitting fallow since 2016 and has the most beautiful healthy soil you have ever seen.
    It will never grow vegetables for market again. From 65,000-80,000# a year to zero overnight.
    Tough petutties
    😎🤙🏻
    Our island grows less than 8% of the food consumed here.

  9. Cortez the famous explorer……made a statement in his later years that is so relevant “ no nation is more than 30 days from eating ones own people “……truly food for thought….🍖🍗🥩🥓🦴

  10. Hm. I wonder how many farms will be left after the gov takes them all for ‘carbon sequestration.’ Oh yeah! I forgot! The Chinese will have all their farms here in the U.S. Think they’ll be growing food for us? Ummmmm, I think not. I see all those crops feeding China. Just a hunch.

  11. Let’s put some numbers on all this…

    The US has about 900 MILLION acres of Farmland with another couple HUNDRED million that could be pressed into service….

    This is the main reason our adversaries would like to take over the USA without poisoning this precious and valuable resource.

    Kill us and leave all the good stuff

    Additionally, the US is home to about 20% of all the surface fresh water on the planet…Accessible Good Water == Good Agriculture

    Kill us and leave all the good stuff.

    I’m sure the USDA rated 900 million acres doesn’t include my crappy, red dirt NE GA 30 acres…BtW I can grow stuff to eat just fine (and there are multiplied Millions of marginal acres all over the USA just the same…)

    Billy Boy and and the ChiComs, at this point, own acreage in the 100s of Thousands, admittedly probably prime land.

    Remember, if they owned 1 Million acres: 1/900 = 0.0011 or 0.11%

    Not good, but not scary. I would outlaw the ChiComs from owning farm land in the US simply because US citizens are not allowed to do the same in China. Simple as that.

    California has about 25 Million acres – this is all good stuff where we probably get more than 3/4 of most of our fruits and vegetables, but except for some special items that require their climate – we can grow it elsewhere in the US (just not as cheap.) California: 25/900 = 0.028 OR 2.8%

    Seeds and fertilizer (natural and man made) are the keys (besides water) to growing stuff for the US in places other than prime land aka California.

    Oh, you can live just fine eating fresh fruit/vegetables, only in season..

    That’s how most of us very old people grew up…No dang watermelons in December (from Chile or Peru etc…)

    <bb

    1. bb…

      Correct. Together the United States and Canada control over 90% of the world’s food resources, which is capable of being doubled, if needed.

      People are literally paid NOT TO GROW things, here in N. America!

      No other “Food Cartel” exists anywhere else, which comes close…and food itself is the real wealth of these two Nations…with which they may attain all the GOLD they may ever desire.

    2. Thanks for the perspective. Sounds like an EMP would do the trick…

      1. Not contaminating the land, or destroying the critical infrastructure, supporting the land, is why our enemies all include EMP in their strategies for dealing with the U.S..

        Now, all that is needed is for China to use a puppet nation, which can be blamed for using an EMP attack against the U.S., while they actively do everything in their power to try and “save” us from the results of this attack, with the permission of our President.

  12. Not sure about that, Ision. 2021 figures, US exported $177 billion in food (out or $1.264 trillion in production) and imported $171 billion. Canada exported $59.8 billion (out of $134.9 billion in production) and imported $42.6 billion. Total global value of agriculture production was $5 trillion ($1.4 trillion for US and Canada). Combined contribution to food for others was $23.2 billion, or 1/2 of 1%. North America (US, Canada, Mexico) together certainly can be self-sufficient in food, energy, finance, and regional security if we choose or are forced to. We cannot, however, feed the whole world. And dark, cold days are coming.

    1. The figures you use are not relevant to the actual food production capabilities of the U.S., or Canada, but just reflect their current, managed, market contributions.

      The figures I am talking about are the official government intelligence appraisals of food production capacity, not current marketing status.

      The study was first performed by the CIA in the 1970’s as part of their study on the probable effects of Climate Change and how this would effect global political environments. At the time of the study, it was assumed the Earth’s climate would continue to cool down, as it had been for the previous 6,000 years, as the Earth moved back into a much cooler climate, which is twice as long in duration, than our current “warm,” inter-glacial, epoch.

      Nothing has changed. The Earth is still cooling down, as it was expected to do, despite the Global Warming propaganda, and we are still right on track for the termination of this very old inter-glacial, which only hold sway on Earth for 1/3rd of the time. The other 2/3s of the time, we refer to as “Ice Ages.”

      With the continued cooling will come a reduction of effective agricultural lands around the world, both in the higher latitudes, away from the Equator, and for lands at higher altitudes, above sea level.

      In short, what this all means is that the U.S. & Canada, will absolutely control the bulk of the world’s food production, as other Nations lose their crop lands before they can replace their highly engineered crops with more resilient strains.

      This fact will provide the U.S. and Canada with great influence in an ever hungrier world.

      Let’s hope the Earth stays warm…and hope it gets WARMER…as the reverse is much more deadly, and troublesome. But, alas….C02 has NOTHING to do with our Climate’s mean temperatures…and has not stopped our steady, planetary, cooling from its warmest point in the last 12,000 years.

      1. Ision, Right back atcha maybe? Conditions and understanding have changed in the past 50 years. World pop has more than doubled since 1970. Number of farms in US has dropped by 15% and acres in production by 10%. It’s been built over in a significant part. Water resources have gone to urban populations and then to the sea. Farmer pop has aged. We are in an interglacial (warmer) period in the Pleistocene Ice Age. We are also about 400 years into the warming phase of the current Hallstatt/Bray bi-millennial solar cycle with about 600 years to go until we hit the next cooling phase. The Modern GSM, and the one due in the 2400s, are just potholes in that road. Some say that if industrialization hadn’t started just as we entered this cycle, we might be experiencing a freezing ELE. I’m largely with Kula re things I can’t change. Making sure pantry is fully stocked with favorite libations and snacks. Then gonna hunker down behind my blade of grass.

        1. Again….
          The capability to grow food is not determined by the current status of farmers, or the Ag business, whatsoever….nothing to do with the current acreage under cultivation, or even the current state of the supporting infrastructure.

          It is determined by all the existing land, which is now, or can be made, capable of growing desired crops, on the North American continent. This is then compared to all other locations on Earth using the same variables and dynamics.

          As an example: Just the Central Valley of California, if all of its available land is put to the plow, could feed the entire U.S. all by itself. Thus, is the power of modern agriculture unleashed.

          Just as with “The Energy Crisis”….any food crisis, will be the direct result of government policy and not human capability.

        2. Ision, Capability for agricultural production is not merely defined as arable land. Perhaps what you mean is the potential for agricultural production. Vastly different from what we are capable of or what is possible. For land to be “put to the plow” in any effective way first you need all the infrastructure to support having a plow. Then, depending on the crop, you need location, day length, water, weather, fertilizers, vegetation control, pest control, and pollinators. And sufficient capable people to manage every step from seed production through planting, growing, harvesting, processing, and distribution. Do we have the possibility to feed everyone on earth? No, given the cost and necessary inputs, can’t agree with you there.

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