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Saving Agricultural Land: A Regional Agenda Item
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Food processing alone is a $7 Billion industry annually in Northeast Ohio and that figure does not take into account the value of farming. The Lake County Soil and Water Conservation District recently published a report on the cost of providing government services to agricultural land, versus the cost of serving agricultural land that is developed for residential use. The report summarizes that it simply costs more to service residential areas and the net tax revenue from residential areas is less than it was as agricultural land (taking into account lost economic benefit from wineries and beds & breakfast, etc). Lake County SWCD wants to use this report to increase awareness in the sub-region about agriculture as an economic driver. They reached out to me at ANEO and said, "how can you help and how can we work together." While Wayne County may not use its agricultural land exactly the same way they do in Lake County, I can assure you that folks in Wayne County are fighting the same battle - they know that their agricultural heritage creates more economic value than suburban sprawl could ever create in their communities. I'd like to help the region's agricultural community to come together and create a shared regional agenda for preserving agricultural land. How should we do this and who will lead the agenda's implementation once its formed?
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Please keep me in the loop/let me know how I can help.
George,
Can we do a meet the bloggers on Agribusiness? Or, if we do a series of symposiums or such around the region, would there be interest in engaging you all as part of the "infrastructure" of conducting them? (ie recording and processing and publicizing info?)
Laura Steinbrink Director, Regional Partnerships lsteinbrink@futurefundneo.org
Gloria Ferris hails from Wayne County, interestingly enough, and she has some experience with the transition in that economy over the past few decades--the actual number of decades is classified information. Rosemary Palmer is from there, as well. George, too, may be semi-rural as well as demi-urban.
Laura,
My company can help with the grassroots mobilization on a regional level. In fact, working with real people, real citizens, real children, real families - and their supporting institutions - is how we really desire to make a difference.
Give a call or email. I'd love to hear more about what you need.
Georgia Reash
President
Community Transition Partners
(440) 263-3923
Laura, I put some ideas around your question: "agriculture regionalsim agenda development" post, but I am not sure if it will link to this. I put it under Business Growth and called it Regionalism Strategies. Still trying to figure out your posting system.
Hope these ideas offer some help.
G
The American Farmland Trust is a national organization that advocates for the preservation of farm and ranch land. Its mission is to stop the loss of productive farmland and to promote farming practices that lead to a healthy environment. Its website is an excellent resource on issues that impact farms on a national, state, and local scale: http://www.farmland.org.
Laura:
Thank you for your post. Agriculture and food systems are the leading industry in the state but are often neglected as we plan for the future. The Advance NEOH region spends over 10 billion dollars each year on food. By sourcing just 10% of that - relatively non-discretionary- buying power with locally grown and raised foods we would keep several billion dollars of wealth in our communities.
Governor Strickland's new Ohio Food Policy Council will be looking at how we can grow the local food systems in the state. There are also ways we have been promote planning at the county and regional levels to maximize this purchasing power. Would love to to have Advance NEOH and others engaged in this process.
This is one example of how the "highest and best use" for farmland is agricultural production.
Amalie Lipstreu, Coordinator
The Farmland Center, a program of the Countryside Conservancy
www.thefarmlandcenter.org
Leadership is currently emerging from the grassroots toward preserving farmland. The action is taking place in developing local food systems. It makes sense to most that food grown nearby can be fresher and healthier and should require less energy to transport, than food produced hundreds or thousands of miles away. It also makes intuitive sense that buying from neighbors can build wealth in communities, both in financial and social terms. I think these are some of the reasons that the interest is so widespread.
A Northeast Ohio Food Systems Collaborative has formed to work towards local food systems in NE Ohio, with a number of participating organizations and very capable leadership from quite a few committed members. Likewise, we've recently come together as an Ohio Local Food Systems Collaborative to work on developing the infrastructure throughout Ohio, using a website much like this one to help maintain the collaboration (see and subscribe at www.oardc.ohio-state.edu/amp/olfsc). The Ohio Food Policy Advisory Council is tied into the OLFSC as well. These efforts are working towards economic development, centered in the agricultural community, that will preserve farmland by creating opportunities for farmers and in the process advance NE Ohio. I think you can certainly support the work it takes to bring forth and keep such grassroots efforts together. Of course you've already started with this site. I'm a lot less concerned about who will lead, as long as the many leaders we have are connected enough to be heading in the same direction.
The OSU Agroecosystems Management Program, Rural-Urban Interface program, Ohio State University Extension, and many of our partners can help with research (intuitive sense of the benefits of agriculture and local food systems is great but data can be even more powerful as the Lake County report demonstrates) and education, as can the many other Colleges and Universities in the Region. We’d be happy to support the networking and collaboration as well.
Casey Hoy
Kellogg Endowed Chair in Agricultural Ecosystems Management
Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center, Wooster