Peter Wiley wrote:
In article , katy
wrote:


Dave wrote:

On Mon, 27 Feb 2006 18:32:57 -0500, katy
said:



a lifestyle that is part of
our history


The notion has a certain romantic appeal, but the lifestyle passed 30 or 40
years ago. The family farm is today a creature of Madison Avenue used almost
entirely in defense of large agribusinesses.

Michigan is still small farm based...as are several other states...


Lessee......

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/usa/states/michigan/

Population - 9,938,444 (as of 2000) [Michigan is the eighth most
populous state in the USA, after California, New York, Texas, Florida,
Illinois, Pennsylvania and Ohio]
Major Industries - car manufacturing, farming (corn, soybeans, wheat),
timber, fishing

Somehow, Katy, I don't think that anyone can really claim that Michigan
is small farm based. Even the farming listed - corn, soybeans & wheat -
are broadacre agribusiness farming.

Sorry, but you're wrong. There may well be a lot of small farms, but
unless you can show some figures showing they produce a significant
amount of food, they simply don't count economically.

And, like it or not, you're in a global economy. Your oil comes from
overseas. Increasingly minerals come from overseas. You aren't self
sufficient in much if anything including food probably, once the lack
of chemicals and fuels are factored in (broadacre farming only works
with a high energy budget). Most 1st World economies are the same. I
don't particularly like this myself, but it's still a fact.

As a matter of national strategy I can see making a case for food self
sufficiency in basic foodstuffs. However this *always* gets rorted and
you end up with export mountains (funded by taxpayers) dumped to try to
salvage something. In the process you trash other economies. That's
both the USA and the EU.

Don't even start me on sugar.

PDW

Michigan fruit farmers are almost all calssified as small farms"
http://web1.msue.msu.edu/fruit/

same with sugar beet growers...

http://www.ipmcenters.org/cropprofil...ugarbeets.html

For that matter, most of the people I know who sow corn and wheat
have 300-600 acre farms, are family run, and sell off to coops or at
the local granary...same with beef production in Michigan. We have
two farms that raise beef within 5 miles of our house. One farm has
a herd of about 100 cattle while the other has less...that is the
norm for beef and daity farms in Western Michigan. I've lived there
for all but a short part of my life and am very familiar what does
and does not exist there...