Family farm fading fast

In the US, most farms are run by managers while owners live off-farm much more so than in NZ, said Christine Finnegan, a Glen Oroua dairy farmer and part-time farm adviser. The family farm, of which much is made in the US, is rapidly becoming a thing of the past reports The Manawatu Standard. She is just back from the International Farm Management Congress in Illinois. There were about 250 people from all over the world, and the five-day congress included three days of seminars, while the other two days were spent on field trips. Most people attending were farm management consultants, some farmers and also university extension staff, who were on holiday at the time. Ms Finnegan said she was amazed that so many people owned land, but didn't live on it. "There are about 70,000 farm owners who work on their own farms, but there are two million farms, so most are managed for the owners," she said. There is a big tier of farm management consultants in the US, some of whom organise farm leases. "The big arable farm had no fences. It was inter-generational. There were the granddad and grandmother, their 50-year-old son who ran the farm, and the next generation and their young children." Ms Finnegan said she was keen to talk about farm succession, but was told it was still a taboo subject. And most people did not pass on farms to their offspring until they died. Farmers feel they are doing it tough with the world recession, and fighting to survive, with dairy farmers receiving about half of what they had been paid. "The urban-rural divide is much bigger in the US. "Lots of urban people have no idea where their milk comes from." But Ms Finnegan said the farmers are still a strong lobby group, who have and expect subsidies on their rural operations, from rural houses to dairy production.