
According to American Farm Bureau Chief Economist John Newton, National Agricultural Statistics Service data indicates that farm numbers in the United States decline by 4,400 farms in 2020. Colorado was one of five states that bucked the trend, gaining 100 farms last year. States that lost the most farms were located in the upper Midwest, with Michigan, Indiana Wisconsin and Minnesota each losing about 500 farms. Farm number peaked at almost 7 million in 1935, but had decline to just over 2 million farms by the mid 1970’s. The number of acres of land farmed has been fairly constant at about one billion acres since the 1920s, and over the past four decades the average farm size has remained at nearly440 acres.