Trend of older farmers, fewer farms shows no signs of reversing: StatsCan

OTTAWA – The number of farms in Canada is dropping while the age of farmers is growing, and Statistics Canada says there’s no sign of the trend reversing.

The agency looked at the makeup of the agriculture industry based on data from the 2011 agricultural census.

Statistics Canada says there were 205,730 farms in 2011 — a decline of more than 74,000 since 1991.

There were also fewer farmers under the age of 40.

The data shows more than half of all farms in 2011 had operators over the age of 55 — up from less than 38 per cent in 1991.

Statistics Canada says less than one out of 10 farms were run by someone under 40, whereas two decades earlier it was about one in four.