Extension Services Keep Farmers Farming

Kelly Marshall

aaeaThe purpose of the federal cooperative extension program was to provide research for agriculture, helping individual farmers by serving the industry as a whole.  Now a new study from Penn State University has taken a look at the effectiveness of those programs.

Stephan Goetz writes in his paper that an estimated 137,000 farmers in the last 25 years would be working elsewhere if not for the extension programs.  That’s an important number to consider when looking at the value of extension services, since there are already fewer and fewer farmers producing food.

“The underlying concern is, if we are losing farmers at too fast a pace we may not be able to grow our own food,” Goetz said.

This paper, co-authored by Meri Davlasheridze of Texas A&M-Galveston, was recently chosen to be published in Applied Economic Perspectives and Policy. It not only looks at policy and agriculture, but also the impact on traditional farming communities in rural areas; where cuts in extension funding could lead to a big economic downturn.

“There is tremendous return to the community,” Goetz said. “The numbers are clear. These services are making an impact. (Extension services) are helping create and keep jobs and doing it for less money.”

You can access the paper by contacting Jay Saunders at jsaunders@aaea.org in the AAEA Business Office.

Agribusiness