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FACT BRIEF

Is Bill Gates the largest owner of farmland in the US?

By Olivera Perkins
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YES

Bill Gates owns 242,000 acres of farmland, according to a forbes.com article, which referenced a landreport.com article. Total farmland in the U.S. totaled 897,400,000 acres in 2019, the latest available number, according to a 2020 United States Department of Agriculture report. That means the Microsoft mogul owns about 0.027% of all of the farmland in the U.S.

The Forbes article cites a January 11, 2021, article by The Land Report that credits Michael Larson, who manages the Gates' personal portfolio as well as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

From The Land Report: "According to a 2014 profile of Larson in the Wall Street Journal, these investments include at least 100,000 acres of farmland in California, Illinois, Iowa, Louisiana, and other states ... According to the Land Report 100 Research Team, that figure is currently more than twice that amount.

See a full discussion of this at Lead Stories
This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
Sources
The Land Report | The Magazine of the American Landowner Bill Gates: America’s Top Farmland Owner
US Department of Agriculture Farms and Land in Farms 2019 Summary February 2020
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR
Lead Stories
Lead Stories is a fact checking and debunking website at the intersection of big data and journalism that launched in 2015. It scouts for trending stories, images, videos and posts that contain false information in order to fact check them as quickly as possible. It actively monitors the fake-news ecosystem and doesn’t wait for reader tips or reports before getting started on a story.
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About fact briefs published on Gigafact
Fact briefs are short, credibly sourced summaries that offer “yes/no” answers in response to claims found online. They rely on publicly available, often primary source data and documents. Fact briefs are created by contributors to Gigafact —a nonprofit project looking to expand participation in fact-checking and protect the democratic process. See all fact briefs here.