Number of Va. Tobacco Farms Continues to Fall

Source from:  TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER BY JOHN REID BLACKWELL 06/07/2004

Data reflect trend that call for U.S.-grown leaf is in major decline The number of tobacco farms in Virginia dropped by nearly a third from 1997 to 2002 and acreage declined 44 percent, according to new data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Virginia had 4,184 tobacco farms in 2002, down from 6,067 in 1997, the USDA reported in its 2002 Census of Agriculture, published Thursday. The census is done every five years. The decline reflects a long-term trend. The number of tobacco farms in the state plunged in the 1960s, then increased from 11,654 in 1969 to 16,367 in 1978. It has been dropping ever since, according to USDA records. The 31 percent drop since 1997 - the largest decline since the mid- to late 1960s - seems to confirm what farm organizations and other industry observers have suspected: An increasing number of tobacco growers, especially smaller operators, are retiring or going out of business as demand for U.S.-grown leaf continues to drop drastically. The acreage of tobacco produced in Virginia also declined from 53,770 in 1997 to 30,308 in 2002. Tobacco remains Virginia's largest single cash crop, but the value of production fell to $73 million in 2003 from $121 million in 2002, according to a separate report. Annual tobacco-production quotas set by the federal government have fallen by more than 50 percent since 1997. Several factors have contributed to the decline, but the main reason is the high cost of U.S. leaf compared with tobacco grown in South America and Africa. The decline in farms is also a result of a long-term trend toward larger farms, as smaller operators have found it harder to justify raising the crop. "If you go back a number of years ago, we had a lot of growers that could make a living on a small amount of acreage per farm," said Stan Duffer, regional market development manager for the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. The number of farms growing burley, flue-cured and other types of tobacco all appear to have declined between 30 percent and 33 percent since 1997. In North Carolina, the leading U.S. tobacco producer, the number of farms dropped from 12,586 in 1997 to 7,850 in 2002. For the United States, the number of tobacco farms dropped 39 percent from 93,530 in 1997 to 56,977 in 2002, while the acreage fell 49 percent, from 837,363 to 428,631.cc Enditem