Transcript Document
The Standard View of Farm Life in Alabama is That A Lot of Farmland Vanished. In fact, the situation is more complicated. Farmland was transformed. To see how, we have to look at some numbers. Table 1. Land In Farms (in acres, all numbers x 1000) USDA, Economic Research Service (ERS), "Farm Real Estate Historical Series Data, 1950-1992", Statistical Bulletin No. 855 Year 1950 1954 1959 1964 1969 1974 1978 1982 1987 1992 A. Number of Farms 220 168 129 102 85 78 59 55 49 46 B. Land in Farms 21300 21200 17600 16200 15000 14600 12500 11800 10700 9800 What Happened to the Apparently Missing Farmland? Most of it wasn’t actually pure farmland to begin with, so it didn’t actually disappear Most of it was actually mixed light pasture land with moderate hardwood tree cover. This mixed pasture land was converted to other uses, mostly forestland. Table 2. Land Use (in acres, all numbers x 1000) USDA, Economic Research Service (ERS), “Major Land Uses 1945-1992", Stock No. 89003 Year 1945 1949 1954 1959 1964 1969 1974 1978 1982 1987 1992 A. Total 32690 32690 32690 32678 32545 32452 32452 32452 32491 32491 32480 B. Crop Only 8266 8271 7481 6028 5211 5885 5797 5888 5642 4803 4539 C. Total Forest D. Forest Only Including No Pasture Grazing 18748 18817 20766 20771 21749 21748 21333 21333 21179 21659 21941 4889 8305 10785 16000 17241 19437 19444 19452 19479 19965 20337 E. Woodland as Pasture 13859 10512 9981 4771 4508 2311 1889 1881 1700 1694 1604 C (Total Forest) = D (Pure Forest) + E (Woodland as Pasture) Confusion Occurs Because: -Sometimes “forestland” (D) is counted as including only “pure” forestland but not including any mixed treecovered pasture land (E). This forestland (D) increased rapidly in extent. -Sometimes “forestland” (C) is counted as including both “pure” forestland (D) plus tree-covered pasture land (E). This Total Forestland (C) stayed fairly steady in extent. These Major Changes Occurred: -The old mixed pasture land (E) was largely converted to forestland composed mostly of fast-growing evergreens -”Pure” cropland (B) diminished, but only by about half -Total farmland (see Table 1), including “pure” cropland (B) and mixed pastureland (E) , decreased considerably, primarily by conversion of old the mixed pasture land to forestland Differing Points of View -To someone who sees only total farmland (from Table 1), it appears as if farming has collapsed -To someone who sees only pure cropland (B), farming declined steadily then bottomed out -To someone who sees only total forestland (C: including old tree-covered pasture land), forest cover has remained steady -To someone who sees only pure forestland (D), fast-growing evergreens replaced nearly all the old mixed pasture that was covered by hardwoods (E)