Overview and history of corporate farming in the U.S.?

Question

I'm working on a newspaper story about organic gardening and I'm trying to get an overview of the history of corporate farming in the U.S. and some of the big-name corporations normally associated with corporate farming, since it seems that the increasing emphasis on organic gardening and farming is, to a large degree, a reaction against corporate farming. Any resources anyone could point me to would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

Corporate farming is a term that describes the business of agriculture, specifically, what is seen by some as the practices of would-be megacorporations involved in food production on a very large scale. It is a modern food industry issue, and encompasses not only the farm itself, but also the entire chain of agriculture-related business, including seed supply, agrichemicals, food processing, machinery, storage, transport, distribution, marketing, advertising, and retail sales. The term also includes the influence of these companies on education, research and public policy, through their educational funding and government lobbying efforts. "Corporate farming" is often used synonymously with "agribusiness" (although "agribusiness" quite often is not used in the corporate farming sense), and it is seen as the destroyer of the family farm. Two percent of all farms in the United States are owned by corporations or other non-family entities, but only half of those farms earn more than $50,000 per year.[1]

Critics argue that the ultimate goal of corporate farming is to vertically integrate the entire process of food production, from the development of proprietary strains of DNA through to the distribution and sale of food to consumers. Some corporations are considered to be well on the way to achieving this objective, and have become very large in the process, such as Archer Daniels Midland and the privately held Cargill, with 2004 revenues of $62.9 billion.[citation needed]

"Corporate farming" is a fairly broad term that deals with the general practices and effects of a small number of large, global corporations that dominate the food industry. It does not refer simply to any incorporated agribusiness enterprise, although most agricultural businesses today are in some way economically connected to the dominant food industry players. As such, it may be thought of as a movement, which is at times also referred to as "anti-corporate farming".

Source(s):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_f...

Answer 2

This U.S. Dept. of Agriculture site may be of some help.