Program Information

According to the Merriam-Webster’s dictionary an Acre is a unit of area equal to 43 thousand 560 square feet or 4 thousand 840 square yards. To Virginia’s agriculture producers… an acre is their office.

ABCs of Agriculture informs about Virginia's farming community and how it affects you. ABCs of Agriculture are produced by the Virginia Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom (AITC) - an educational program which encourages and enhances agricultural literacy in Grades K-5 and 6-8.

Transcript

Hello, and welcome to the ABC’s of Agriculture! We’re here today to talk about the letter A, for Acreage!

According to the Merriam-Webster’s dictionary an Acre is a unit of area equal to 43 thousand 560 square feet or 4 thousand 840 square yards. To Virginia’s agriculture producers… an acre is their office.

In Virginia there are nearly 8.67 million acres of farmland. The typical Virginia farmer is 56 years old and owns a 182-acre farm. The most farmers operate on about 50 to 179 acres…

So…. with that said, one could say that two-thirds of Virginia is still in forestry or farms.

The top five commodities from these farm acres in Virginia are …. Chickens, Beef, Dairy, Turkeys and Greenhouse/Nursery operations.

Now here is some more numbers for you to think about in acres… in the United States, the average size of a farm is 441 acres…

If you are still having difficulty understand just how large an acre is… It is just slightly smaller than the size of a football field! (Which is technically 1.36 acres!) I knew I should have brought my calculator!

For the ABC’s of Agriculture, I’m Professor Brad. See you next time!

Virginia Standards