Fewer young people see future in farming

It's difficult for young farmers to get started.
VERSAILLES, Ohio (AP) -- Jeff Wuebker got into farming after his father died of a heart attack eight years ago.
"That made me an instant hog farmer," said Wuebker, 35, who inherited the family farm in southwest Ohio along with his brother. This year, they will spend more than $1 million to expand their hog operation.
But fewer young people are choosing farming as a career because of the expensive costs of land and equipment and competition from large farm operations.
In Ohio, the number of farms operated by 25- to 44-year-olds fell from 7,855 in 1992 to 6,001 in 2002, a 24 percent drop, while the number operated by those 45 and older increased 6.8 percent to 17,406, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture statistics. That's among farms with annual sales of $10,000 or more, run by farmers who spend at least half of their work time farming.
Nationwide, the percentage of farmers under 35 is the lowest it's ever been, said Mike Duffy, director of the Beginning Farmer Center at Iowa State University.
That means production is being concentrated in fewer hands, which deters innovation and makes addressing environmental issues more difficult, Duffy said.
"We'd better be concerned about it, or we're just going to lose a whole generation," Duffy said.
Getting started
Wuebker said it would be "just impossible" for most young people to get started in farming without help from their families or someone else.
Cost is the biggest barrier to entry into the industry, experts say. Land can be particularly expensive near metropolitan areas, where competition for property is high.
It takes good business sense, a love of the work and help with capital for young people to become farmers, said Melanie Wilt, spokeswoman for the state Department of Agriculture.
One implication of the parallel trends of aging farmers and fewer young farmers is that "as we go forward, we're going to be really wrestling with the transfer of farm assets," said Constance Cullman Jackson, vice president of agricultural ecology for the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation.
As baby boomers leave the industry, the transition is important, she said. Ultimately, the trends could lead to more consolidation.
The Farm Bureau supports federal legislation that would eliminate capital-gains taxes when farmland is sold to a beginning farmer or rancher, Jackson said.