A billboard along Interstate 70 boasting about the productivity of Kansas farmers may say more about what’s happening in agriculture than those who put it there realize. The message seems simple and straightforward: “1 Kansas Farmer Feeds 155 People + You!” A closer look reveals it’s been crudely updated — an indication that the tally changes with some frequency. The steady escalation of the number of people fed by a single Kansas farmer — from 73 in the 1970s to 155 today — reveals how lots of small farmers have been replaced by large farmers intent on getting even bigger. That trend threatens scores of small towns that sprouted on the prairie in a different time, when larger numbers of small farmers depended on them. Many of Kansas’ small towns look weathered, worn and neglected after more than a century of exodus.
(Read more: KCUR)