Oregon Farm Bureau : About OFB

About Oregon Farm Bureau

The Oregon Farm Bureau (OFB) is a voluntary, grassroots, nonprofit organization representing the interests of the state's farmers and ranchers in the public and policymaking arenas. As Oregon's largest general farm organization, its primary goal is to promote educational improvement, economic opportunity, and social advancement for its members and the farming, ranching, and natural resources industry as a whole. "The voice of Oregon agriculture," OFB works to find solutions that will benefit all of the state's agriculture producers.

OFB traces its roots to 1919 when the Umatilla County Farm Bureau was established in the heart of the state's wheat country. The Oregon Farm Bureau was formally incorporated in 1932. The state's headquarters remained in Pendleton until 1949, when it moved to Salem. Farm Bureau is organized in all 36 Oregon counties. Today, OFB has about 54,000 members, with about 8,900 of these being professionally engaged in agriculture.

The county Farm Bureau is the foundation for Farm Bureau at the state and national levels. Oregon has 32 organized, active county Farm Bureaus covering all 36 Oregon counties. Each county Farm Bureau has its own board and officers and is a vital link between the organization's membership, its policy development, and implementation efforts. Country-wide, Farm Bureau's 5.5 million member families are organized into more than 2,900 county Farm Bureaus.

Among Farm Bureau's core principles are voluntary membership; open, democratic, and transparent processes of governing, finance, and policymaking; equal opportunity; the importance of family; and above all, power resting in the hands of voting members.

OFB is part of the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), a member-funded, politically independent federation of nearly 3,000 county Farm Bureaus throughout the United States and Puerto Rico. AFBF's 5.5 million members make it the largest agricultural group in the world.