“The State of the States” report shows the extent, location, and quality of each state’s agricultural land and tracks how much of it has been converted in each state using the newest data and the most cutting-edge methods. The Agricultural Land Protection Scorecard analyzes six programs and policies that are key to securing a sufficient and suitable base of agricultural land in each state and highlights states’ efforts to retain agricultural land for future generations. It offers a breakthrough tool for accelerating state efforts to make sure farmland is available to produce food, support jobs and the economy, provide essential environmental services, and help mitigate and buffer the impacts of climate change. 

Agricultural lands are essential to a more resilient America that is better prepared for crises.

Farmland is vital to this nation’s food security, yet it continues to be paved over, fragmented, or converted to poorly planned residential, commercial and industrial uses. Between 2001 and 2016 alone, 11 million acres of the nation’s irreplaceable agricultural land was lost or fragmented, equal to all the land in the U.S used to produce fruits, vegetables and nuts in 2017.

Roughly 4.4 million of these acres were “Nationally Significant”— our best land for food and crop production.  

Because of the COVID-19 pandemic, millions of Americans have seen empty grocery shelves for the first time in their lives. We have come to realize how critically important farmers are to us, how we turn to them in crises, and how they innovate to meet demand. But they can’t do their job and we won’t have sufficient healthy food without farmland. 

The U.S. holds the world’s greatest concentration of fertile soil suited for growing food and other crops. However, only 39% the agricultural land in the lower 48 states is defined by AFT as “Nationally Significant” land, which can reliably produce abundant yields for many decades to come, if farmed sustainably.   

Each state needs to secure a critical mass of high-quality farmland to ensure that its food system is resilient in the face of extreme disruptions. After all, what is more essential to human life and society than healthy food? We need agriculture, especially environmentally sound “regenerative” agriculture, to survive. As a nation, it will take regionally diverse and sometimes redundant systems to support the increasingly complex public demands on agriculture. All states must act to protect farmland. 

The 12 states with the most threatened agricultural land are: 

1) Texas 2) North Carolina 3) New Jersey 4) Tennessee 5) Georgia 6) Rhode Island 7) Connecticut  8) South Carolina 9) Massachusetts 10) Delaware 11) Florida 12) Pennsylvania  

Action is particularly urgent in the South where threats are high, but policies are limited.

Farmland is at severe risk in the South, where agricultural land is being urbanized and converted to low-density residential land use at a rapid pace.  Six of the top twelve states with the most threatened agricultural land are in the South according to the new report.   

Importantly, states in this region of the country have often enacted fewer public policies to protect agricultural land.  States in the South that were identified as having a high degree of threat and low policy response include Texas, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, South Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana.  There is a particularly critical need for state policymakers to act in these states.