Overview:
A new report by the Massachusetts Legislature's Special Commission on Agriculture in the Commonwealth in the 21st Century has found that two out of three farmers in Massachusetts operated at a loss in the last year alone, with farms selling product for 94.8 cents to every dollar spent on production. The report highlights the challenges faced by farmers, including high startup costs, unpredictable weather conditions, low profit margins, and the high cost of land. It also provides recommendations to address these issues, including creating grant programs for farming, investing in climate-controlled infrastructure projects, and supporting the next generation of farmers.
Growing food has always required hard work, but longtime farmer Joe Czajkowski of Joe Czajkowski Farm in Hadley said today’s farmers face more challenges than ever.
Now, a new comprehensive report released last month by a special agricultural commission created by the Legislature three years ago to examine the most urgent challenges vexing farmers provides data supporting Czajkowski’s claim.
The report, published late last month, found that two of every three farmers in Massachusetts operated at a loss in the last year alone, with farms selling product for 94.8 cents to every dollar spent on production. Land, a valuable resource for the small state, not only costs 3.4 times more than the national average, but the state lost approximately 27,000 acres of available farmland between 2017 and 2022.
These hurdles, along with high startup costs, unpredictable weather conditions and low profit margins, are deterring a new generation from picking up the till, leaving older farmers without a successor, the report found.
“We are at risk of not getting to scale in that same way as farmers in the Midwest that are growing on these huge, very mechanized farms,” said state Sen. Jo Comerford, whose 25-community Hampshire, Franklin and Worcester District includes hundreds of small- to mid-sized farms. “We do it differently. I think we do it better, but regardless, our cost of doing business in Massachusetts is higher.”
All these factors driving up costs for farmers are outlined in the report from the Massachusetts Legislature’s Special Commission on Agriculture in the Commonwealth in the 21st Century. The commission’s report is based on information gleaned from nine hearings across the span of 14 months, at which more than 40 testifiers — farmers, educators, researchers, legislators, government administrators, and subject matter experts from Massachusetts, surrounding states, and other countries — discussed their work and their recommendations on how to better support and sustain agriculture in the Bay State.
The commission’s final recommendations address the most urgent issues facing agriculture in Massachusetts and present achievable solutions that the Legislature and administration could undertake to best support our farms and farmers in the next 25 years.
The 64-page report focuses on five key issues farmers face today: climate change and natural disasters, technical assistance, farm energy, economic and cultural development and food security. Under these categories, the report offers 63 recommended actions for state leaders to ensure the state’s agricultural industry persists for years to come.
“Our job is to lean in and do the best we can to help them make the math work,” said Comerford, a co-chair of the Special Commission. “We’ve seen such downward economic pressure on farms and this has lots of recommendations that would help strengthen the position of farmers economically.”
Claire Morenon, communications manager at Community Involved in Sustaining Agriculture, the South Deerfield-based nonprofit that for 30 years has worked to strengthen farms, said the broad report captures the complexity of farming in today’s landscape. As the federal government shifts funding priorities or revokes grants, this report attempts to provide new funding tools for natural disaster relief, farm energy and food security.
“So many of them [recommendations] are definite and clear needs, and the tools for addressing them are being reduced right now,” Morenon said.
Czajkowski notes that the special commission relied heavily on testimony from administrators of farming advocate groups or other public officials rather than farmers themselves. Many of the commission’s recommendations involve creating grant programs for farming, but Czajkowski said it should not require government subsidies to make his numbers work.
“The [Agricultural Preservation Restriction Program] program needs to be revisited and reimagined,” he said. “The farmers get the money, buy the equipment, and in 15 years, the equipment is rusted. The value of their farm does not increase like other asset classes do.”
Katelyn Billings, spokesperson for Comerford, said suggestions from farmers did influence Comerford and former Rep. Natalie Blais’ “omnibus” agricultural bill (S. 2801, H. 4854) — Fostering Agricultural Resilience in Massachusetts (FARM) Act — that includes many of the recommendations from the commission’s report.
“It [The FARM bill] is doing pretty well in part, I think, because this commission helped focus people’s attention on what more we can, and should, do to help farms continue operating in the commonwealth,” Comerford said.
On the last day of 2025, the legislation has moved from the Agriculture and Fisheries Committee to the House and Ways and Means Committee.
Robust climate preparedness
The first recommendation of the report examines the destructive floods in the summer 2023 that wiped out thousands of acres of crops. In the wake of that weather event, the state created a Disaster Relief and Resiliency Trust Fund, and allocated $14 million in fiscal year 2025 for farmers impacted by the weather. The one drawback is that the fund has no permanent way to finance this account moving forward.
As the weather warms – an average of 2.75 degrees Fahrenheit in Massachusetts alone, according to the report – farmers may see these severe weather events more often. The report insists on continually investing in a safety net for farmers.
In preparation for unpredictable growing seasons, the Special Commission takes a preventative approach by suggesting the Massachusetts Department of Agriculture Resources creates new grant programs for climate-controlled infrastructure projects like greenhouses, protective equipment during extreme weather and electric farm equipment.
“Those are really costly investments for farms to make, so I think having more direct financial support that makes it possible for them to afford those sorts of improvements can be very important,” Morenon said.
Other parts of the report make recommendations for ways the state could compensate farms for their contributions to public health. For instance, farmers could receive money for bolstering biodiversity, soil health and water filtration in a payment for ecosystem services program. Or farms in the area, such as Red Fire Farm, that donate produce to local food banks could receive a $25,000 tax credit for their contributions. Additionally, the Department of Public Utilities should adjust solar net metering policies to allow farmers who installed dual-use solar on their farms, like Czajkowski, to sell energy back to the grid at competitive rates.
“Dual-use solar payments are like our pensions,” Czajkowski said.
Supporting the next generation
A sizable chunk of the report zooms in on the University of Massachusetts Extension as an the state’s best tool to tackle several agricultural challenges, Comerford said. Extension Agriculture Program Director Clem Clay said UMass Extension employs entomologists, plant pathologists, soil scientists, and other experts to “translate good science into sound management.” These programs not only train farmers, but fill knowledge gaps around new technology, like agrivoltaic solar.
“As described in the Special Commission report, barriers to success in farming include access to land, capital, and knowledge,” Clay said in a statement. “As agriculture embraces new technologies and diversifies to include more production and business models, the demand for UMass Extension to develop and deliver expertise continues to grow.”
UMass Extension received $2.9 million in funding from the federal government in 2023, only $400,000 more than the $2.5 million Extension received in 2009. These payments have not kept up with inflation, and the state does not fund its extension program at the same rate as other states. Thus, the report opts to raise the state’s funding match for extension programs.
“UMass Extension can and should and does enter into all of these conversations,” Comerford said. “The truth is, we haven’t funded it in the way that is that has allowed it to be as robust as we need it to be.”
However, raising a new generation of farmers will require more than just UMass. Acting on the commission’s findings, Comerford included the Next Generation Farmer Fund in the FARM bill. This account would create grants for vocational schools, 4-H programs and other community-based organizations, like the New England Small Farms Institute.
Healthy food for all
Community, in fact, is a key aspect of Massachusetts agriculture. The Commonwealth pioneered the Healthy Incentives Program (HIP), which gives Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) enrollees extra funds to purchase local produce from farms. Despite 263,000 people signing up for HIP since its inception in 2017, one in three families report issues with food security.
With unstable global food supply chains and shrinking federal report for SNAP, the Special Commission members turn to the farms in our backyard. The report suggests that MDAR should set, track and report agriculture production goals and farmland sales, as well as purchase farmland, to ensure local agriculture can sustain the state. By creating a year-round HIP program and reimbursing schools for food purchased at local farms, families will have increased access to food all year.
Preserving farmland
Nothing is more important to the future of farming in the state as land. The report found that Massachusetts land prices are some of the most expensive in the country, with competing interests like housing and solar driving up the costs.
“Big wide open fields are really great for solar installations but we don’t get more farmland than we have,” Morenon said. “So converting that out of agriculture use is a huge loss to the agriculture system.”
Comerford and Blais have been longtime advocates of solar on the built environment, but she admits that as the technology changes, so must the Legislature’s approach. Many of the report’s regulations look to incorporate more solar while conserving crop production and prime soils.
“Our job as policymakers is to see the whole picture and try to figure out regulations and recommendations that allow for, in this case, farmers to stay farming at the highest level,” Comerford said. “And meet our climate goals, and do that while protecting public health.”
Part of these goals also looks to counteract Massachusetts’s shrinking farmland. The report advises the Legislature to invest more into the APR program and speed up the rate that it purchases deed restrictions. Vacant lots or underutilized land can be converted into urban farms.
But these are not the only ways to support the future of farming in the commonwealth. The FARM Bill and this report are only two of many tools to help farmers in the future, Comerford said. There is always more work to be done.
“This report doesn’t pretend to be all things about farming. It answered a call for greater conversation around these particular issues,” Comerford said. “This report might resonate for some farmers. It might not resonate for others. It’s basically a set of tools.”