Nationwide, the number of farm transitions has increased in recent years. Yet questions remain for both younger and older generations considering this process. The University of Minnesota's Jim Salfur said, for example, one of the biggest questions out there is how can a beginning farmer without a home farm get in to the business?

"They're going to have to partner up because they just don't have the equity to lock, stock, and barrel buy somebody out."

That partner being an existing farmer that can share knowledge and experience with the younger grower. Nationwide the average age of a farmer continues to rise, but Salfur believes that may not necessarily be cause by a lack of successors.

"I also think that people are aging better so we maybe don't have that older generation that's antsy to get out of the industry."

Another factor involving the ifs and whens of farm transitions? But, the bottom line, he continued. 

"A lot of our farms maybe just aren't really big enough to support two families. So you've gotta work through that and try to determine does that mean one of them, either the old or young generation works off the farm."

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