But for too many of these aspiring farmers, needed tools and resources-land, credit, and training-are out of reach.Īmong the states struggling with an aging farming population is Illinois, where the average age of farmers is 57.8 years and just 18 percent of farmers are beginners. Young people, women, and people of color want to farm, and they will be critical to advancing innovation to ensure a more prosperous, sustainable, and socially just future for agriculture. At the same time, they also present an opportunity. These demographics reflect persistent inequities and a legacy of racial discrimination in the food system, and they threaten agriculture’s long-term resilience. The average age of farmers in the US has been steadily increasing, reaching 58.3 years in the most recent census, and farm operators have historically been overwhelmingly male and (non-Hispanic) white. And they remind us that even as we focus our energy on shaping a better federal farm bill, there's a lot we can do to transform our food system at the state and community level.Īcross the country, local chapters of the National Young Farmers Coalition advocate for policies that will sustain young, independent, and prosperous farmers now and in the future. The rankings, and the stories behind them, point to opportunities and offer models for improving every state's food system. And while Arkansas's overall score was low, it ranked in the top 10 for farming outlook and farm investments. For instance, Vermont, which had the highest overall score, was outranked by 23 states when it comes to reducing agriculture's ecosystem impacts. Most states scored well in at least a few categories, but few scored well in all of them. The results show that both the failures and the promise of the US food system are distributed broadly-and sometimes in surprising ways-across the 50 states. Finally, we averaged state scores across all 10 categories. We then grouped the indicators into 10 broad categories and calculated scores for each state in each category. First, we gathered publicly available data on a wide range of indicators. UCS created the 50-State Food System Scorecard to help answer these questions. How close are we to realizing this vision? What do we know about the overall health, sustainability, and equity of the food system across the United States? From farm to fork, our food system should be something we are proud of-supporting farmers, workers, and local economies ensuring that everyone has access to enough nutritious food to stay healthy and protecting our soil and water for the future.

State level food system indicators