Afarmer is a person engaged inagriculture, raising living organisms for food or raw materials.[1] The term usually applies to people who do some combination of raising fieldcrops,orchards,vineyards,poultry, or otherlivestock. A farmer might own thefarmland or might work as alaborer on land owned by others. In mostdeveloped economies, a "farmer" is usually afarm owner (landowner), while employees of the farm are known asfarm workers (or farmhands). However, in other older definitions a farmer was a person who promotes or improves the growth of plants, land, or crops or raises animals (as livestock or fish) by labor and attention.
Over half a billion farmers aresmallholders, most of whom are indeveloping countries and who economically support almost two billion people.[2][3] Globally, women constitute more than 40% of agricultural employees.[4]
History
Farming dates back as far as theNeolithic, being one of the defining characteristics of that era. By theBronze Age, theSumerians had an agriculturespecialized labor force by 5000–4000 BCE, and heavily depended on irrigation to grow crops. They relied on three-person teams when harvesting in the spring.[5] TheAncient Egypt farmers farmed and relied and irrigated their water from theNile.[6]
Animal husbandry, the practice of rearing animals specifically for farming purposes, has existed for thousands of years.Dogs were domesticated in East Asia about 15,000 years ago.Goats andsheep were domesticated around 8000 BCE inAsia.Swine or pigs were domesticated by 7000 BCE in theMiddle East andChina. The earliest evidence ofhorse domestication dates to around 4000 BCE.[7]
In theUS of the 1930s, one farmer could produce only enough food to feed three other consumers. A modern farmer produces enough food to feed well over a hundred people. However, some authors consider this estimate to be flawed, as it does not take into account that farming requires energy and many other resources which have to be provided by additional workers, so that the ratio of people fed to farmers is actually smaller than 100 to 1.[8]
More distinct terms are commonly used to denote farmers who raise specificdomesticated animals. For example, those who raise grazing livestock, such ascattle,sheep,goats andhorses, are known asranchers (U.S.),graziers (Australia & UK) or simplystockmen. Sheep, goat and cattle farmers might also be referred to, respectively, asshepherds,goatherds andcowherds. The termdairy farmer is applied to those engaged primarily in milk production, whether from cattle, goats, sheep, or other milk producing animals. Apoultry farmer is one who concentrates on raisingchickens,turkeys,ducks orgeese, for eithermeat,egg orfeather production, or commonly, all three. A person who raises a variety of vegetables for market may be called atruck farmer ormarket gardener.Dirt farmer is an American colloquial term for a practical farmer, or one who farms his own land.[9]
In developed nations, a farmer (as a profession) is usually defined as someone with an ownership interest in crops or livestock, and who provides land or management in their production. Those who provide only labor are most often calledfarmhands. Alternatively, growers who manage farmland for an absentee landowner, sharing the harvest (or its profits) are known assharecroppers orsharefarmers. In the context ofagribusiness, a farmer is defined broadly, and thus many individuals not necessarily engaged in full-time farming can nonetheless legally qualify underagricultural policy for varioussubsidies, incentives, andtax deductions.
Indeveloped nations, however, a person using such techniques on small patches of land might be called agardener and be considered ahobbyist. Alternatively, one might be driven into such practices bypoverty or, ironically—against the background of large-scale agribusiness—might become an organic farmer growing for discerning/faddish consumers in thelocal food market.
Farming organizations
Meeting of the Eastern Illinois Beekeepers Association, 1914
Farmers are often members of local, regional, or national farmers' unions or agricultural producers' organizations and can exert significant political influence. TheGrange movement in the United States was effective in advancing farmers' agendas, especially against railroad and agribusiness interests early in the 20th century. TheFNSEA is very politically active in France, especially pertaining togenetically modified food. Agricultural producers, both small and large, are represented globally by theInternational Federation of Agricultural Producers (IFAP), representing over 600 million farmers through 120 national farmers' unions in 79 countries.[11]
Youth farming organizations
'Farming is a public service' shirt
There are many organizations that are targeted at teaching young people how to farm and advancing the knowledge and benefits ofsustainable agriculture.
TheNational FFA Organization (formerly known as Future Farmers of America) was founded in 1925 and is specifically focused on providing agriculture education for middle and high school students.
Rural Youth Europe is a non-governmental organization for European youths to create awareness of rural environmental and agriculture issues, it was started in 1957 and the headquarters is inHelsinki, Finland. The group is active in 17 countries with over 500,000 participants.
Income
Annual changes in prices received by farmers, top and bottom countries in 2022
Farmed products might be sold either to amarket, in afarmers' market, or directly from a farm. In a subsistence economy, farm products might to some extent be either consumed by the farmer's family or pooled by the community.
Occupational hazards
"Death's Album of Careless Illinois Farm Folks", a 1949 cartoon listing 275 tractor-related accidents the previous year, and 183 livestock-related incidents
There are several occupational hazards for those in agriculture; farming is a particularly dangerous industry.[12] Farmers can encounter and be stung or bitten by dangerous insects and other arthropods, includingscorpions,fire ants,bees,wasps andhornets.[13] Farmers also work around heavy machinery which can kill or injure them. Farmers can also establish muscle and joints pains from repeated work.[14] Farmers also faces unique mental stressors, like the stress of uncertain crop yield based on weather events and uncertain economic stability due to market fluctuations. In the US, farmers are 3.5 times more likely to die by suicide than the general US population.[15]
Etymology
The word 'farmer' originally meant a person collecting taxes from tenants working a field owned by a landlord.[16][17] The word changed to refer to the person farming the field.Previous names for a farmer werechurl and husbandman.[18]
^Dyer 2007, p. 1: "The word 'farmer' was originally used to describe a tenant paying a leasehold rent (a farm), often for holding a lord's manorialdemesne. The use of the word was eventually extended to mean any tenant or owner of a large holding, though whenGregory King estimated that there were 150,000 farmers in the late seventeenth century he evidently defined them by their tenures, as freeholders were counted separately."
^Bailey, Garrick; Peoples, James (11 January 2013).Essentials of Cultural Anthropology (3 ed.). Cengage Learning (published 2013). pp. 121–122.ISBN9781133603566. Retrieved2019-10-10.Peasants [...] are looked down on by higher classes ("he has a peasant mentality").
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