UT Extension Month & National AG DAY - Celebrating American Agriculture

It's National Agriculture Week!
Celebrate with a fun fact for the Day…
Did you know? 






Since today is Ag Day, let’s talk about agriculture on the home front.  Here are some thoughts to stimulate your thinking of the world’s safest and most abundant food supply (which is right here in the “Good Ole USA”)…

• 2 million farms dot America’s rural landscape.  About 99 percent of U.S. farms are operated by families – individuals, family partnerships or family corporations.  America's Diverse Family Farms, 2016 Edition
• One U.S. farm feeds 168 people annually in the U.S. and abroad. The global population is expected to increase to more than 9 billion by 2050, which means the world’s farmers will have to grow about 60 percent more food than what is now produced.
• In 2015, $133.1 billion worth of American agricultural products were exported around the world. The United States sells more food and fiber to world markets than we import, creating a positive agricultural trade balance.
• Farmers and ranchers receive only 16 cents out of every dollar spent on food at home and away from home. The rest goes for costs beyond the farm gate: wages and materials for production, processing, marketing, transportation and distribution. In 1980, farmers and ranchers received 31 cents.
• About 23 percent of raw U.S. farm products are exported each year.
• Farm and ranch families comprise just 2 percent of the U.S. population.
• One in three U.S. farm acres is planted for export.
• 31 percent of U.S. gross farm income comes directly from exports.
• U.S. farm programs typically cost each American just pennies per meal and account for less than one-half of 1 percent of the total U.S. budget.
• Americans enjoy a food supply that is abundant, affordable overall and among the world’s safest, thanks in large part to the efficiency and productivity of America’s farm and ranch families.
• Today’s farmers produce 262 percent more food with 2 percent fewer inputs (labor, seeds, feed, fertilizer, etc.), compared with 1950.

 
Now how is that “food for thought?”  Next time you enjoy a cheeseburger at the ballgame, a glass of milk with your Oreos, a fresh salad, a slice of white bread (to go with those tomatoes we are going to talk about tomorrow), a slice of pizza at the fair, watermelon at the family reunion, bacon with your eggs for breakfast (and the list goes on), think about where and how that meal was produced.
 
Sure…there could always be arguments about GMO’s or organic versus conventional, or cage-free and pasture–fed options, but the thing to acknowledge is we are ALL involved with agriculture each and every day.  Even if it is the clothes we wear, the make-up we apply, the tires on our vehicle we drive to work every day, the footballs (or baseballs or basketballs) at our favorite college rivalry sports games, the fuel we use to mow the lawn, our favorite beverage after a long days work, the crayons our young people use in art class, or just the roof literally over our heads housing products generated from American farms (both big and small) that we use on a daily basis...agriculture touches our lives. It touches yours; it touches mine...

​EVERY SINGLE DAY!

RESOURCES:
​http://www.fb.org/newsroom/fast-facts

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