Missouri near the top in the number of lost farms

2026-10-29

Between 2017 and 2022, only Texas and Oklahoma lost more farms than Missouri, which saw 8 percent of its farms disappear during the period of the last national agricultural census. That continued a 30-year trend of lost farms in the Show Me State, as older farmers retired or died and had few heirs to carry… Read more »

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Declining populations and labor forces put rural Missouri counties under pressure

2026-10-27

Shrinking labor forces and population loss are pressuring rural Missouri to find new revenue sources to balance budgets and avoid tax increases for residents who can’t afford them. Local officials are finding that protecting a county’s future takes more than saying no to change. Federal labor and population statistics place several rural Missouri counties in… Read more »

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Rural Missouri counties have higher-than-average premature death rates

2026-10-21

Premature death rates among residents of rural Missouri counties exceed the national average, records show, a result in large part due to the lack of adequate emergency medical care. According to data compiled by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, three rural Missouri counties have premature death rates that are more than… Read more »

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Rural Missouri counties have higher premature death rates than national average

2026-10-21

Premature death rates among residents of rural Missouri counties exceed the national average, records show, a result in large part due to the lack of adequate emergency medical care. According to data compiled by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities, three rural Missouri counties have premature death rates that are more than… Read more »

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Rural Missouri counties face EMS crisis

2026-10-19

Rural Missouri counties are part of an emergency medical services (EMS) crisis, as decreasing populations and tax bases, combined with the closing of multiple hospitals, have caused treatment times to rise to almost double those in urban areas. Slightly more than 24 percent of Missourians live in non-metro areas, according to a report from the… Read more »

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