Family Farmers Are The Future. Let’s Celebrate Them!

This article was written by Niman Ranch partners Food Tank. Food Tank is a research and advocacy nonprofit organization devoted to storytelling that highlights how food and agriculture can be the solution to some of our most pressing environmental and social problems. 

Family farms are the backbone of our food system.  

More than 90 percent of farms—about 500 million—are run either by individual or family labor! More than 1.5 billion people worldwide are involved in family farming, and these operations produce more than 80 percent of the world’s food value, according to U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) data. 

Across regions and biomes, no two family farms look the same. Family farmers are fishers, pastoralists, peasants, Indigenous peoples, mountain farmers, smallholders, and medium-scale growers. 

Without family farms, we would not eat. And without family farms, a regenerative and equitable future is not possible.  

“Independent family farms are the bedrock of healthy rural economies,” Jordan Treakle, National Programs and Policy Coordinator for the National Family Farm Coalition, tells Food Tank.  

But family farmers are also vulnerable to challenges including the climate crisis, lack of support and financing, and limited access to land resources and market opportunities, says Esther Penunia, the Secretary General of the Asian Farmers’ Association for Sustainable Rural Development. 

And they’re in danger of being overpowered by industrial giants: Farms that operate on less than 2 hectares (4.9 acres) account for more than 8 out of every 10 farms globally—but only control about 12 percent of all agricultural land, according to the FAO Family Farming Knowledge Platform data. 

In short, business-as-usual can no longer carry us into the future. As Penunia put it, we have to “unleash the potential” of small-scale family farmers to lead the way toward a more regenerative, localized, and financially viable future for the global food system. 

“The next generation of farmers…know that something is wrong in the wider industry and that something has got to change,” Ethan Roberts, a 22-year-old fifth-generation farmer in Iowa, tells Food Tank. “If they want to pursue their dream of farming, they’ve got to find a different way to do things.” 

This is a huge reason I respect companies like Niman Ranch, which provides a guaranteed market for members of its network of farmers and ranchers across the United States, while also helping them uphold sustainable, humane practices.  

For example, Eric Boor took over his great-grandfather’s nine-acre farm in southern Iowa four years ago. Many of his family and community members doubted he could be financially successful while farming in a more humane way. But now, alongside Niman, the Boors are currently the only farmers in their county raising hogs outdoors. 

“There’s a lot more brainstorming on how to actually raise animals and crops than just your industrial [model]. It does seem like a brighter future,” Levi Wahl, a fifth-generation sheepherder in Oregon, tells Food Tank. 

“Family farming is resilient,” says Martín Uriarte, President of the World Rural Forum. 

So, let’s give our farmers the support they deserve!