In the case of decline, recognize these counties experienced substantial losses of
farmers and farmland and were heavily populated to begin with, so the decline may
largely be a function of urbanization pressures and have less to do with agricultural
structural characteristics. That being noted, it is apparent that decline counties have a
relatively strong reliance on dairy and grain sales (Table 6). Further, it is interesting to
note that nearly 45 percent of the decline counties are in the North Central Region (Table
8), suggesting a relationship between the declining fortunes of certain traditional,
Midwestern commodities and agricultural trajectory. Overall, the largest decline in the
proportion of sales from livestock occurred in the decline counties, falling from 58% of
total sales in 1987 to 46 percent of sales in 1997. While there is some higher value
production in these counties, (24% from nursery, fruit, and vegetable sales on average), it
is not well established as in other types of growing counties and perhaps not large enough
to offset declining sales in cattle & calves, dairy, or grains.
Insert Table 6 about here
Insert Table 7 about here
Insert Table 8 about here
Deintensify counties were the most reliant on sales from livestock in 1987 and
despite a fall from 66% of sales on average in 1987, sales from livestock remained
important in 1997 (57% of total sales.). Interestingly, sales from cattle and calves was a
very substantial proportion of sales in deintesifying regions and the decline in the number
of farms with cattle and calves or beef cows was modest (in fact, the number of farms
with beef cow sales grew between 1987 and 1997 in decline counties, Table 7).
Convention