America’s Diverse Family Farms, 2018 Edition

The farm typology, or classification, developed by ERS primarily focuses on the “family farm,” or any farm where the majority of the business is owned by an operator and individuals related to the operator. USDA defines a farm as any place that produced and sold—or normally would have produced and sold—at least $1,000 of agricultural products during a given year. USDA uses acres of crops and head of livestock to determine if a place with sales of less than $1,000 could normally produce and sell that amount. Farm size is measured by gross cash farm income (GCFI), a measure of the farm’s revenue that includes sales of crops and livestock, Government payments, and other farm-related income, including fees from production contracts