WNC Lost 87 Percent of Tobacco Farms in 6-Year Span

02/11/2009

Western North Carolina lost more than 1,700 tobacco farms between 2002 and 2007, and the region as a whole lost farms at a higher rate than the state. That's according to the 2007 Agriculture Census recently released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and an analysis done by Charlie Jackson, executive director of the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project in Asheville. While the news is striking, it's not all grim. "The fact that over 1,700 farmers stopped growing tobacco but the region only lost less than 700 farms means that most former tobacco farmers are growing other things," Jackson said. "There are opportunities for farmers to make the transition from tobacco." Jackson gleaned these statistics from the Census: For the 23 -county Advantage West region, 1,708 farms stopped growing tobacco between 2002 and 2007. That's down from 1,959, an 87 percent decline. The region as a whole also lost farms at a higher rate than the state as a whole. The state as a whole lost 1,017 farms, a 2 percent decrease, and 536,383 acres, or 6 percent, in farms. WNC lost 679 farms, or 6 percent, and 115,447 acres, or 11 percent. The WNC counties losing the most farms, in order, were Wilkes, Yancey, Madison, Watauga, and Buncombe. The counties losing the most tobacco farms, in order, were Madison, Buncombe, Yancey, Ashe, Watauga. Ross Young, director of the NC.C. Cooperative Extension Service office in Madison County, said the figures are "not surprising." At one time, the county had more than 2,000 burley tobacco growers, a number that has dwindled to between 50 and 100 now. "I see it every day - people going out of business or struggling with ways to recapture income lost, primarily from tobacco," Young said. "It's a daily conversation I have. So it sounds as though those numbers are consistent with what we've experienced in real life." The federal buyout of the tobacco support program, which went into effect in 2005, is the main reason so many growers got out. The program, started in 1938, provided a baseline price for tobacco but also imposed quotas on how much leaf farmers could grow. Enditem