Could apprentice farmers, better access to economic development tools like revolving loans and tax credits, and helping farmers to prepare for droughts, flooding and other extreme weather help Oneida County farms to survive and prosper?
A new agricultural strategic plan for Oneida County from 2025 through 2030 — developed by the county, Cornell Cooperative Extension of Oneida County and planning consultants at LaBella Associates — highlights all of those things as part of the pathway to a thriving farm community.
“This plan is a bold step toward ensuring that agriculture remains a cornerstone of Oneida County’s economy and identity,” Oneida County Executive Anthony Picente Jr said in a statement announcing the plan’s release on July 31. “We are not just preserving farmland — we are building a system that supports our farmers, grows our food economy, connects our communities and makes Oneida County a model for agricultural innovation and resilience.”
A further look at the plan
The plan identifies five strategic goals based on areas in which successful activities are already taking place in the county and in which the county has competitive advantages over the rest of the state.
They are:
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Farmland preservation and protection.
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Economic development and business support.
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Agritourism and local food promotion.
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Workforce development and farm transition.
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Sustainability and climate resilience.
Projects suggested
The strategic plan then suggests 21 projects that fall within those five goals with a mix of easier, short-term projects and harder, longer-term projects. Each project was then scored for impact, feasibility and urgency.
Three projects also received five bonus points as being of the highest priority: supporting the agricultural education provided by the Cornell Cooperative Extension; emergency response training; and having positions at the extension and in the Oneida County Department of Planning dedicated to farmland protection and agricultural economic development.
The report also provides more detailed implementation strategies for four priority projects to be developed right away, although they are not the projects with the highest scores.
These priority projects include:
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Helping farmer and agribusinesses to participate in agricultural economic development programs such as revolving loans, grants and tax incentives.
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Starting a farming apprenticeship or internship program to train the next generation of farmers.
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Doing an agriculture-specific analysis of the Oneida County Hazard Mitigation Plan and any future plan updates to help farms become more resilient to droughts, flooding and other environmental and climate risks.
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Encouraging municipalities to develop new comprehensive plan with farm-friendly land-use regulations as suggested by the county’s Agriculture-Friendly Municipal Guide.
“These priority projects are designed to generate meaningful impact, particularly in areas like supply chain growth, land use planning, and workforce development,” Oneida County Commissioner of Planning James Genovese said in a statement. “By aligning our agricultural strategy with broader economic, educational and climate goals, we are laying the foundation for a more resilient and prosperous farming community.”
Implementation of the plans
The report considered the findings of past agricultural plans and the relative success of their 171 action items, 70% of which have not yet been fully enacted.
So this plan establishes an Agricultural Implementation Committee, coordinated by the county and the Cornell Cooperative Extension. It will oversee working groups focused on each of the five goals who will meet to track progress and adjust strategies as needed.
Farmer Dave Curtin, of Bridgewater Farms in Cassville, speaks in this O-D file photo of a press conference on April 22, 2025 to announce that Chobani will build a dairy processing plant in Rome, which will, when it’s fully operational greatly increase the demand for milk in New York. Curtin already sells milk to the company’s yogurt plant in West Edmeston.
“This is more than a plan — it’s a commitment to our farming families, our rural economy, and the next generation of growers,” Picente said in the statement.
Data considered
The reported looked at the United States Department of Agriculture’s analysis of a food dollar in 2022, which found that only 15.7% of the money spent on food went to farms for selling raw foods, the lowest amount since the analysis began in 1993.
But 84.3% of the money spent on food went for the processing and distribution of food, showing the need for more local food processing capability and for more farm sales directly to local consumers and institutions, according to the report.
More: Chobani founder Hamdi Ulukaya: New factory in Rome means ‘coming home’
More: Oneida County Public Market opens May 17. What can you buy and do there this summer?
And here’s some agricultural data and trends in Oneida County contained in the strategic plan with statistics from the USDA’s 2022 Census of Agriculture:
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There were 834 farms in the county in 2022 and they sold $190 million worth of products.
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Cow milk, produced by 90 farms, is the county’s most valuable agricultural product with nearly $109 million in sales in 2022. That’s 57% of the total value of all agricultural products in the county. The second most valuable product was grains, oilseeds, dry beans and dry peas, which were worth close to $38 million or 20% of the agricultural total in the county.
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Only six other product categories accounted for more than 1% of the value of the county’s agricultural products: corn, 15%; other crops and hay, 7%; vegetables, melons, potatoes and sweet potatoes, 6%; fruits and tree nuts, 5%; cattle and calves, 5%; and soy beans, 4%.
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The long-term trend toward consolidation of farms and larger producers continued between 2017 and 2022. The number of farms with $500,000 or more in annual sales rose from 33 to 65 and the market share of these farms went up from 53% in 2017 to 82% in 2022.
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On the other hand, 23% of market share for agricultural products sold still belonged to the 196 farms with $1,000 or less in sales in 2022.
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The total number of acres of farmland in the county fell by 133 acres, or 14%, between 2017 and 2022 (compared to a statewide loss of 5%).
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But the trend toward more big farms continued with the amount of land in farms of 1,000 or more acres increasing. In 2022, more than half of the county’s farmland belonged — 51% — belonged to farms with at least 500 acres and 20% belonged to farms with at least 2,000 acres.
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Between 2012 and 2017, Oneida County farmers started selling more of their products directly to consumers. In 2012, 165 farms sold $3.6 million worth of products directly to consumers and by 2017, 152 farms sold $5.7 million of product to consumers. But that number fell by 2022 with 150 farms selling just $4.7 million of products to consumers.
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On the other hand, between 2017 and 2022, farmers started selling more to retail markets, institutions and food hubs for local or regionally branded products — from $1.4 million in sales to $2.9 million in sales, an increase of 112%. And farms the value of processed or value-added products county farms sold rose 213% between 2017 and 2022, reaching sales of almost $1.9 million.
This article originally appeared on Observer-Dispatch: Oneida County releases agricultural strategic plan to help local farmers prosper