Making sure your family farm stays a family farm takes a lot of time and work and is the subject of a session being hosted by Extension UW Madison later this week. According to the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, there were over 58,000 farms in Wisconsin in 2022, ten percent less than in the state five years prior. An aging farmer population is one of the reasons why you are seeing fewer farmers, but there is some encouraging news. The state has 28,000 farmers considered “new or beginning” in the industry, a 16 percent increase over 2017. To see that number continue, family farm owners need to begin planning who will take over the operations once the current owner dies or retires. Extension UW Madison Kewaunee County Agriculture Agent Aerica Bjurstrom says she does not see people discouraging their sons and daughters from entering the industry but reminds them that it is not a cheap industry to get into or sustain.
The fourth and final farm succession planning workshop will take place at the Weyers-Hilliard Branch of the Brown County Library in Howard on April 2nd from 1 to 4 p.m. Joy Kirkpatrick and Kelly Wilfert, both Extension Farm Management Outreach Specialists, will provide a framework to help farms identify risk and begin those first conversations around succession planning.
