Saving Arizona Farmland
Nationally, farmland is lost to development at the alarming rate of 40 acres per hour. Maricopa County is a prime example of this trend— farmland in Maricopa is being lost at a higher rate than anywhere else in the United States. American Farmland Trust’s (AFT) Farms Under Threat 2040 report discusses the loss of farmland throughout the U.S., and Maricopa County farmland is being paved over the fastest in the entire nation. Arizona as a whole is losing farmland the fastest. According to the AFT report findings, “444,500 acres of Arizona’s farmland and ranchland will be paved over, fragmented, or converted to uses that jeopardize agriculture by 2040. That represents an area more than the size of Phoenix.”
Farmland loss is hitting every kind of farmer at every level. Urbanization, urban sprawl, and development is displacing farmers and farmland and what land is left is often unaffordable and inaccessible to local farmers, or being sectioned off so they can’t grow anything on it. Many farmers also lack access to capital and other resources needed to expand their farming operations or even just get started.
Click the buttons below to learn more about how you can join us in preserving farmland in Arizona for future generations.
Why Preserving Farmland Matters
In 2020, Maricopa County lost over 200 acres of prime farmland from small- to medium-size local food farmers due to urban sprawl and development growth. Small- to medium-size food farmers provide their community with fresh, locally grown food and are especially vital to communities that don’t have access to affordable healthy foods by donating to food banks and through programs like FEED Phoenix and Friends of the Farm.
The COVID-19 pandemic is revealing just how rigid, consolidated, and fragile our current food system is—one that revolves around industrial agriculture and imported food. When shelves become empty because big food supply lines are disrupted, who steps in? Our local farmers do. They show us how much they love their communities by not letting us go hungry.
Once farmland is gone, it’s gone. When we lose that source of nourishment for our community and children, we also lose that connection to the place where our food comes - permanently. That’s why preserving farmland is so important.
Reason 1:
Food affects us all
Local food farmers not only provide food but nutrition security, too. Without local farmland, the ability to feed and provide accessible, healthy food to the people in our state becomes nearly impossible and requires us to rely on fragile global food chains and distributors.
Reason 2: Connection through food
Farmland is not only the backbone to having a thriving local food system that allows us to feed our community members, but farmland also connects us to where our food grows, how it grows, and who grows it. It is through this connection that we understand the importance of growing local food and the valuable role farmland plays in our communities and ecosystem.
Reason 3: Farms contribute to our local economy
On-farm agriculture in Maricopa County is a $1.95 billion per year industry and supports roughly 14,200 jobs, of which an estimated 9,190 were directly supported on-farm. While how and what our farmers grow is changing, agriculture continues to play an integral role in the state’s economy.
DID YOU KNOW?
In 2017, Arizona’s agriculture industry contributed $23.3 billion in sales and supported over 138,000 jobs
Yuma grows 90% of the nation’s supply of leafy greens during the winter
Indigenous farmers and ranchers make up 57% of agricultural operations in Arizona
Over 48% of Arizona farmers are women, making it the state with the highest portion of women farmers in the country