A Year of Progress for Farms, Food and Farmland

As another year draws to a close, we are offered the chance to reflect on our many successes across the country in 2011. We have made strides in addressing the great challenges and opportunities facing agriculture through our work to protect farmland from conversion to nonagricultural uses, promote environmentally sound farming practices and keep farmers on the land. We’re proud of our efforts over the past year to protect and steward America’s working lands and grateful to our partners and supporters for their vital roles in these achievements. Here are a few key accomplishments:

Helping Farmers and Ranchers Protect Working Lands

Our Farmland Information Center helped countless farmers and ranchers explore options on how to protect their land as well as transfer it to the next generation. We also worked on the state level to defend and strengthen farmland protection programs. For instance, when Wisconsin’s Governor Scott Walker put promised funds for the state’s Farmland Preservation Program on hold and called for eliminating it entirely, we mobilized farmers, activists and citizens. The state legislature listened, keeping the program intact and restoring funds for already approved projects. We addressed similar issues by spreading the No Farms No Food® message at “Ag Days” held in Massachusetts and Connecticut and at our rally to support farmland protection and thriving farms in New York.

Bringing Farming and Community Together

Keeping farmers on the land through food market support, smart growth, and community planning for agriculture is an important goal that we pursued in 2011. In California, our Bay Area Agricultural Sustainability Project focused on strategies to support thriving farms, farmland and community. Our Pacific Northwest office kicked off a study in the Seattle region to identify the potential of local farmland to produce additional food for the region and the changes in production, processing and distribution needed to link local farmers to local consumers.  In Rhode Island, we took the lead on a five-year strategic plan that provides a vision for strengthening the state’s agriculture by keeping more farmland in production, and working with public officials and citizens alike to support and promote agriculture.

Keeping Water Clean

Farmers are some of our nation’s greatest environmental stewards, but they face a delicate balance in growing healthy crops while protecting drinking water. Our strategic programs—including work in California, the Chesapeake Bay, Long Island Sound and the Mississippi River Watershed—are helping farmers reduce fertilizer runoff and improve water quality by developing new, innovative tools to boost use of conservation practices. We’ve stepped up efforts to implement our Nutrient BMP Challenge® program, which encourages on-farm conservation and helps reduce the amount of fertilizer flowing from farm fields into waterways. Through the program, farmers have reduced fertilizer use by 24 percent and lessened greenhouse gas emissions by 69 percent and soil erosion by 78 percent on thousands of acres in the Midwest alone.

Transforming Farm and Food Policy

Throughout 2011, we continued in our role of providing results-oriented and pragmatic leadership on farm and food policy. Working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture and others, we brought together leaders from agriculture, the environment and rural development for a National Agricultural Landscapes Forum to improve policy options for sustaining the agricultural landscape and rural regions. This fall we launched Agenda 2012: Transforming U.S. Farm Policy for the 21st Century — our plan for a federal farm bill that supports sound stewardship on working lands in order to safeguard the environment and keep farms and ranches thriving.

A Look Ahead

The coming year will present its own array of opportunities.  The federal budget deficit will continue to spur innovation in developing national and state policy.  High crop prices, development pressure, and adaptation to more volatile weather patterns, will put pressure on the agricultural land base, but American Farmland Trust will bring new research and information, dialogue and common ground among divergent groups and policy support to assure that we save the land that sustains us. We hope you will join us as we continue with our vital work to protect farmland, promote environmentally sound practices and ensure a sustainable future for farmers.

About the author: Katherine “Kitty” Smith is Vice President of Programs and Chief Economist at American Farmland Trust. She previously served as Administrator of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, has served on several United Nations Expert Panels, and chaired the Organization of International Cooperation and Development’s Joint Working Party on Agriculture and Environment.