Rural broadband is essential to modern agriculture, the farmers and ranchers who grow our food and the quality of life for rural Americans. Farm Bureau supports using the Universal Service Fund to expand broadband deployment to rural areas. We also support using a combination of tax incentives, grants and/or regulation to increase the use of broadband access in rural areas. 

Farmers and ranchers depend on broadband just as they do highways, railways and waterways to ship food, fuel and fiber across the country and around the world. Many of the latest yield maximizing farming techniques require broadband connections for data collection and analysis performed both on the farm and in remote data centers. However, 29 percent of U.S. farms have no access to the Internet according the USDA report, “Farm Computer Usage and Ownership, 2017.”

Megan Nelson, AFBF economic analyst, discussed the latest report published by the American Broadband Initiative in a recent RFD-TV story. The report analyzes the possible economic benefits of bringing e-connectivity to the heartland. Watch the clip.