Agriculture and Land Use

Woodland is the largest category of agricultural land in Rhode Island: 27,595 acres (46.7%) of total in 2022. Woodland includes natural or planted woodlots or timber tracts, cutover and deforested land with young growth which has or will have value for wood products, and woodland pastured. It also includes land with tapped maple trees. Total cropland in Rhode Island equaled 16,665 acres (28.2%) in 2022, and is mostly hay and other forage, followed by vegetables, corn for animal feed, and fruit orchards.

Note: data is suppressed for some counties and categories for multiple years.

The average price per acre of farmland in Rhode Island has been over $20,000 for the past 19 years. This is the highest average price per acre in the country. Farm real estate value is a measurement of the value of all land and buildings on farms. The national average for 2024 was $4,170 per acre.

Rhode Island has the most expensive farm real estate values due to its small land area and development pressure.

The number of farms in Rhode Island was estimated at 1,043 in 2017 and 1,054 in 2022. Note that most farms are engaged in more than one type of agricultural activity. The bars in this figure are not mutually exclusive. Nearly 29% (302) of all farms in Rhode Island grow vegetables/melons, 22% (231) grow greenhouse/nursery products, and 20% (210) raise poultry/eggs.

According to the USDA Census of Agriculture, which is generally believed to undercount this measure, edible agricultural products made up 34.6% ($29.8 million) of the total value of agricultural sales in 2022. Vegetables and melons made up the majority of edible agricultural product sales, followed by fruits and berries, and cattle. Newport County actually accounted for the highest percentage of total edible product sales (14.6%), followed by Washington (13.8%), and Providence (11.8%) counties.

The USDA Census of Agriculture, conducted every 5 years, is the foundational data source for food system analyses. It allows for longitudinal, county-to-county, and state-to-state comparisons.

However, local research has found that the Census of Agriculture underestimates the value of food production. For example, the USDA estimate for sales in 2007 was $65.9 million ($81.3 million in 2020 dollars). Using a different approach, University of Rhode Island Professor Tom Sproul conservatively estimated that Rhode Island had agricultural sales of nearly $170.6 million in 2007, more than 2.5 times higher than the USDA estimate. A 2012 update estimated $238.9 million in sales, compared to $59.6 from the 2012 Census of Agriculture. Dr. Sproul’s estimates do match USDA estimates in the sense that greenhouse/nursery sales account for the majority of sales in his analysis.

Colonization, genocide, slavery, and policies pursued by the U.S. government all played a role in the dismantling of Indigenous societies and limited access to agricultural land for non-White people. Today, Black, Indigenous, Asian, and Hispanic Americans own a very small percentage of farms and agricultural land.

Farm ownership in both the state and the country continues to be a mostly White-owned enterprise: White people make up 60% of our country’s population, but comprise 92% of producers, own 96% of farms, and operate 94% of land in agriculture. As of July 2022, 69.9% of Rhode Islanders were White (not Hispanic), but 97.2% of Rhode Island farmers were White. Black Americans make up 9.1% of Rhode Island’s population, but only 1.0% of farmers.

Women make up 51% of Rhode Island’s population but 42.9% (832) of farmers. This percentage does represent an increase from 35% (659) of farmers in 2007.