BUTLER/CUNNINGHAM

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Level 2

AL Ag Facts:

Contract Farming

Selection of Similar Pages

Contract farming occurs when a farmer contracts with a corporation (or other similar large business) to do one, or more, of the following:

1. Buy supplies such as feed or chemicals

2. Buy seed or baby animals

3. Raise the crop and/or the animals at the risk of the farmer

4. Sell the crop and/or the animals to the contract holder or agent, often at prices agreed upon before the raising begins. Sometimes these prices may be adjusted if the market changes radically.

Some people see contract farming as a sound moder business activity while some people see it as a modern form of share cropping, with the local farmer tied to the corporation just as the share cropper of 100 years ago was tied to the land and the owner of the land. Contract farming has boomed in northern Alabama with the concentrated growing of poultry and some hogs. See the page on CAFOs from the page on Environmental Facts, the page on Corporations under US Ag Facts, and the presentations for the BC conference of 2003, all accessible from the Home Page and from the drop-down menu to the right above.

The button to the left opens a working (in progress) paper from a team at the USDA, headed by Mary Ahearn, on the growth of contract farming in the US, and its effects on local farms. Alabama is a prominent case in the paper.