IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/agrhuv/v42y2025i1d10.1007_s10460-024-10619-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Bipartisan creation of US Land Access Policy Incentives: states’ efforts to support beginning farmers and resist farm consolidation and loss

Author

Listed:
  • Julia C. D. Valliant

    (Indiana University Ostrom Workshop)

  • Marie T. O’Neill

    (Indiana University Ostrom Workshop)

  • Julia Freedgood

    (American Farmland Trust)

Abstract

Since 1983, legislators and advocates have introduced Land Access Policy Incentives in twenty of the fifty United States. These bills share a demographic goal: to fund land rental or purchase for young and beginning farmers and ranchers. States’ efforts to facilitate land access are part of a global movement to support farmers’ entry into agriculture and to resist farmers’ increasing exclusion from land. We examine the policy creation processes of nine states to describe how coalitions and government leaders are translating their values around land access barriers into policy tools whose political appeal is broad. The bills often pass unanimously, and enrollments are strong: about 2,000 young and beginning US farmers and ranchers will purchase or rent farms this year through a few states’ land access policy programs. We trace the themes from interviews with 66 of the bills’ authors and advocates, and their documentation and media coverage, to demonstrate the values that bipartisan coalitions enlist to construct successful bills and the compromises that make them politically feasible. The coalitions’ values turn on the threats of rising land costs, farm expansion or consolidation, and land conversion out of agriculture. As a group, the policies serve broadacre farming operations while leaving specialty crop farms largely unserved. Two states have endeavored to include all farmers of color among their policies’ beneficiaries. Our findings demonstrate tradeoffs of states’ current Land Access Policy Incentives and suggest next steps for research and advocacy to inform policy development to support next generation farming opportunities.

Suggested Citation

  • Julia C. D. Valliant & Marie T. O’Neill & Julia Freedgood, 2025. "Bipartisan creation of US Land Access Policy Incentives: states’ efforts to support beginning farmers and resist farm consolidation and loss," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 42(1), pages 421-439, March.
  • Handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:42:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s10460-024-10619-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s10460-024-10619-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10460-024-10619-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10460-024-10619-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:agrhuv:v:42:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1007_s10460-024-10619-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.