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What's New
 Seats are filling fast for American
Farmland Trust’s April 26 conference on planning for agriculture in the Puget
Sound region. The American Planning
Association, Forterra and the Cascade Harvest Coalition have signed on as
cosponsors, and speakers from Pennsylvania, Vermont and
California have been confirmed. Readers who are interested should register soon.
 American
Farmland Trust and a group of local conservation and farmland organizations
have banded together to fight the re-zoning of more than 11,500 acres of
farmland in Pierce County, Washington. The county has very stringent criteria for designating farmland in its Agricultural
Resource Land (ARL) zone and now contends that half of the land mapped in
this zone doesn’t meet the criteria. “If the land is dropped from the ARL zone,
it will be far more vulnerable to suburban development,” said Dennis Canty, Pacific
Northwest director for American Farmland Trust. “This must be stopped now.”
American Farmland Trust is requesting a two-year delay while a study can be
done of the appropriate zoning for all of the county’s 45,000 acres of
farmland.
 On
February 13, American Farmland Trust organized a group of farmers and farmland
advocates to lobby the Washington legislature for an increase in funding for farmland
conservation easements. We met with more than 60 legislators to
encourage them to support an increase of $7.7 million in the farmland
account. The funding would be used for
22 projects that would collectively protect more than 7,300 acres of
farmland. While it will be another tough
budget year, there is widespread support for farms and farmers in the
legislature that we hope to use to secure the additional funding.
 American
Farmland Trust staff in the Pacific Northwest are preparing for a conference on
planning for agricultural in the Puget Sound region that will be held in late
April. “Our aim is to get local planners and officials up to speed on what they
can do to protect farms, farmers, and local food,” said Ele Watts, lead staff
on the project. The team is now identifying speakers who can both inform and
inspire on the topic. Call or write the
office (206-860-4222 or dcanty@farmland.org) if you have ideas.
The
Northwest office released the Western Washington Foodshed Study in mid-December, followed by
several media interviews and two presentations to the Regional Food Policy
Council. The study is the final result
of a two-quarter graduate school course at the University of Washington and
considerable work by a 12-member advisory committee. The study concludes that farmers in the
region are currently producing about one-quarter of what is eaten here, but a
variety of actions at the farmer, processor, retail, and consumer level could
bring the total up above half.
All farmers and ranchers know preparing for the year ahead starts with looking back at the bright spots and challenges from the seasons before. At AFT, we’re proud that in 2012 we rallied farmers and citizens alike to advocate on behalf of protecting farm and ranch land. Our innovative projects helped family farmers pioneer sound farming practices, which help to preserve our land and water resources. We also laid the groundwork to keep farmers on the land by providing tools and resources that allow them to thrive.
We’re sharing accomplishments and inspiration from 2012 in the words of our expert staff.
We have a really significant problem with farmland loss here in the Puget Sound region. We’ve lost about 60 percent of our farmland here since 1950, and of course this is near and dear to our mission as an organization. One of the things I’ve been interested in doing since I got here is to try to develop a strong campaign for farmland preservation in the Puget Sound region, particularly where the rates of loss have been high….We hope that this Farmland Forever campaign is going to result in the protection of more than 100,000 acres of additional farmland here in the region.
Read more from Pacific Northwest Director Dennis Canty
 American
Farmland Trust is organizing a coalition of farmers, ranchers and agricultural
organizations to support a significant increase to state funding for purchase
of easements on farm and ranch land. The most significant state source is the Washington Wildlife and
Recreation Program that has had a farmland account since 2005. The goal
this session, beginning in January, is to increase farmland funding through
this account from the $750,000 provided in 2010–2012—the lowest level of funding
since the creation of the account—to $8.4 million for 2013–2015. This would allow
funding of 22 projects around the state, nearly doubling the number of farmland
projects done since the creation of the account. Contact the Pacific Northwest
regional office at 206-860-4222 if you'd like to help.
On November 7,
Washington’s King Conservation
District presented its 2012 Best Partnering Organization Award to American
Farmland Trust’s Pacific Northwest office. The award specifically recognized
AFT’s Farmland Forever campaign—an effort to protect an additional 100,000
acres of farmland in the Puget Sound region—and the cooperative work on an
innovative conservation program to restore streamside habitat in the Snoqualmie
Valley. “This award means a great deal to us,” said Dennis Canty, AFT Pacific
Northwest Director. “We’re a small organization with a really big mission:
saving farmland and farming in the Pacific Northwest. Without partners like the King Conservation
District, we wouldn’t get anywhere.”
 American
Farmland Trust is working with the Whatcom County government to develop a strategy
for offsetting farmland losses associated with land use development,
habitat restoration, and other non-farm land uses. The work is motivated
by a county council policy seeking to permanently preserve 100,000 acres of farmland for
productive agricultural use. "While this goal is simple,
it is also transformative," says Dennis Canty, Northwest
Director for American Farmland Trust. "Suddenly, every acre of farmland matters."
The policy will borrow from successful programs in California and Vermont
that require that farmland acres lost to development are compensated for through
zoning, development right purchases and other protective measures on
additional land.
 On
October 4, American Farmland Trust convened a blue ribbon group of Washington state agricultural
and environmental leaders to discuss first steps on the Farmland Forever campaign. There is tremendous enthusiasm for
the campaign goals of protecting an additional 100,000 acres of farmland
through a combination of purchase of development rights and protective ag
zoning. The next step is to rally support for additional state funding
for the purchase of development rights in the upcoming Washington legislative session. Look for
opportunities to join the Farmland Forever campaign and take action—coming soon!
 American
Farmland Trust is in the early stages of planning for a spring 2013 conference on
actions that Northwestern communities can take to preserve farming into the
next century. Explained Pacific Northwest Director Dennis Canty, “We hope to bring experts in land use
planning, economic development, marketing, and other disciplines from around
the country into the Seattle area to discuss what we can do in this region to
ensure a successful future for agriculture.” American Farmland Trust is
currently recruiting students from the University of Washington to help with
organizing the conference.
 American
Farmland Trust’s recent success working with USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service and other partners in the Snoqualmie basin – where we are restoring nearly four
miles of key salmon reaches - has stimulated a lot of interest in the role of
voluntary conservation actions by farmers in Puget Sound salmon recovery and
water quality initiatives. AFT staff has recently met with the Puget Sound
Partnership and the Washington State leadership of NRCS to discuss ways to
target incentives in key reaches, combine multiple programs to increase impact,
and enlist communities of farmers and ranchers to lead local restoration and
cleanup efforts. Congress currently has before it a Farm Bill that includes an innovative new program, the Regional Conservation Partnership Program (RCPP). RCPP will provide exciting new opportunities for public-private partnerships to address some of the greatest resource challenges on the land. We hope that Congress passes a final farm bill this year that provides opportunity for continued regional collaboration on priority areas such as the Puget Sound.
 A
top-notch committee is coming together to advise American Farmland Trust’s Farmland Forever campaign, a
multi-faceted effort to prevent greater loss of farmland in the Puget Sound
region. Members include directors for many of the most important farm and
environmental organizations in the Pacific Northwest. In addition, we are forming the Farmland 500 and mobilizing local
members in important farmland protection issues in Pierce and King Counties. We
expect to formally unveil the campaign and our new Farmland 500 website this fall. The first test for the campaign
will be our success in securing additional funding for farmland easements in
the 2013 Washington legislative session.
 Thanks
to the help of three University of Washington graduate student interns over the
summer, American Farmland Trust evaluated more than 400 farm and ranch
properties in three watersheds to determine their potential to produce credits
for emerging environmental markets for wetlands, water quality, and other
resources. We are currently designing a web-based utility to identify parcels
with strong potential to produce credits. According to Dennis Canty, American Farmland Trust's Pacific Northwest Director, “This tool will allow farmers to quickly identify
their best opportunities to make money off new markets and restore the
environment on their land.” AFT has also
met with farm organizations in the three watersheds to enlist their help in
organizing within farm communities to produce and market credits.
 Farmland Forever, American Farmland Trust’s campaign to save thousands of acres of farmland in Washington’s Puget Sound region, got a huge boost from two supporters recently. First, the Washington Women's Foundation selected the project from 270 submissions for a $90,000 grant. The very next day, the Marisla Foundation provided $15,000 more. "We couldn't be more excited about this support," said Dennis Canty, Pacific Northwest Director for American Farmland Trust. "These new partnerships will allow us to move forward quickly to protect thousands of acres of Puget Sound farmland." The funding will be used for outreach to farmland advocates in the region—dubbed the Farmland 500—to organize a campaign coalition of farm, environmental and local food groups, and to prepare funding proposals for state and federal sources. If you'd like to sign up for Farmland 500 mailings, please contact Dennis at dcanty@farmland.org.
 The Pioneers in Conservation program, a grants program supporting farmers using conservation practices in key environmental areas, has recently been awarded matching funds from USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service for work in the Snoqualmie Valley. Funding will be used to supplement small grants to farmers to restore streamside vegetation and repair fish passage barriers. We expect that the Pioneers in Conservation program will result in the restoration of a continuous riparian corridor along more than four miles of critical salmon streams. We will be offering the Pioneers program in two other Washington watersheds this year and are currently investigating the Okanogan, Wenatchee, Hood Canal, and Walla Walla basins as candidates.
In March, our Pacific Northwest staff and interns traveled to the Yamhill Valley and Wallowa Valley in Oregon and the Methow Valley in eastern Washington as part of our project to identify the most threatened farm landscapes in the Pacific Northwest. Dennis Canty explained, "People look at these landscapes and think they'll always be exactly the same. They don't see the problems just below the surface—issues with sprawling growth, rising land prices, and competition for water. Farmers need our help to keep these places intact." A full report on the seven threatened landscapes will be released in early June.
This summer, we will offer grants to several farmers in the Snoqualmie Valley of western Washington through our revitalized Pioneers in Conservation grant program. The focus of the program this year is to determine how to target grants to the highest environmental priorities, encourage neighboring farmers to cooperate on larger projects, and leverage funding from farm bill incentives and other conservation incentive programs. American Farmland Trust is considering a second watershed in eastern Washington as another pilot for this program. The results of the Pioneers program will help steer incentive funding to the Voluntary Stewardship Program adopted by the state legislature in 2011.
American Farmland Trust is ramping up a multi-year campaign to protect farmland in the Puget Sound region. The campaign will focus on two initiatives. The first seeks to protect the large blocks of farmland that remain in the region with a combination of better zoning, local tax and land protection tools, and monitoring by farmland advocates. The second focuses on building a "green wall" between subdivisions and farm areas by buying development rights from farms on the edge. Dennis Canty, Pacific Northwest Director for American Farmland Trust, is beginning talks with other farming and conservation groups to build a coalition to drive the campaign, and is forming a group of local farmland advocates —"the Farmland 500"—to help build community support and advocate for county-by-county progress.
The University of Washington students working on an upcoming foodshed study for American Farmland Trust is finishing their analysis on what we grow versus what we eat in the 19 western counties of the state. A report on the results and on how to build a more local food system is scheduled for release later this spring. The study indicates that we are currently capable of growing about 43 percent of what we eat in the region, but could increase this to more than 60 percent with initiatives to bring previously farmed land into production, strengthen producer-to-consumer links, and reduce food waste.
Look for American Farmland Trust staff this month throughout the Pacific Northwest. We are hitting the road in late March to visit farmers and community leaders in the Yamhill, Wallowa, Kootenai, Spokane, and Methow valleys as part of our project to identify the most threatened farm landscapes in the region. We hope that the project will stimulate additional efforts to protect these areas from urban sprawl, second home development, competition for limited water, and other threats. We will be releasing a report on this project this summer.
Dennis Canty, American Farmland Trust Pacific Northwest Director, has been traveling the Puget Sound Region to present the 2012 Farmland Champion Award. The first-annual award goes to the county councils of the three counties whose farmland protection policies scored at the top in American Farmland Trust’s recent analysis. The study, which provides recommendations for farmland loss, continues to get a lot of attention. The development of farmland, explained Canty in a recent interview, is “so incremental that it can happen and nobody notices. And if we really want local food, if we really want a healthy environment in the Puget Sound, if we really want farmers as part of our communities, we have to stop this.” Be on the lookout for a half-hour interview with Canty that will air on March 24 on the KEXP showMind Over Matters.
Our analysis of the most threatened farm landscapes in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and western Montana is nearing completion. We’ve identified more than a dozen landscapes that have major problems with urban sprawl, second home development, water availability and pollution—and we are in the process of winnowing the list down to the five to seven landscapes we’ll highlight this year. Our work doesn’t end with pointing out the challenges faced in these areas! We’re also reaching out to local groups to build partnerships and develop action strategies to address challenges in each of the landscapes.
Our work continues with the University of Washington on a study of western Washington’s food production and consumption. We have learned some fascinating things so far. Did you know we eat two pounds of food for every pound produced in the region? The strong local demand means that many foods could be produced in greater quantity, including pork, beef, leafy greens and many other vegetables. The focus of our work is now shifting to how to produce more in the region, including opportunities to bring more land into production, increase yields on farmland and modify what we produce to respond to the growing interest in healthy diets.
Farmland is an invaluable resource for the environment, economy and residents of the Puget Sound region, but it continues to disappear at an alarming rate as the greater Seattle area expands. Our new report, Losing Ground: Farmland Protection in the Puget Sound Region,presents findings and recommendations from a study of farmland regulations, tax incentives and development rights programs in the 12 county Puget Sound region. Three counties—Skagit, Whatcom and King—are recognized as the top programs, and there are detailed recommendations on actions that each of the 12 counties can take to better protect farmland and farming.
2011 has been an exceptionally busy year in the Pacific Northwest. It has been a year of building and strengthening relationships to help protect farmland, provide fresh healthy food throughout the region, and support innovative ways for farmers and ranchers to safeguard our natural resources.
As we look toward 2012—including work to forge new partnerships throughout Washington, Oregon, Montana and Idaho—read about our accomplishments from the last year and see a snapshot of what lies ahead.
 There's not much good to say about the economic downturn, but it has brought a welcome lull to farmland conversions in the Pacific Northwest. This may be coming to an end. In Pierce County, Washington, a proposal to convert 180 acres of prime farmland to a new shopping mall and subdivision was recently approved. While the County Council expressed support for farmland protection, the lure of construction jobs was overwhelming with a final 7-0 vote in support of the proposed urban expansion. There are two similar proposals in Skagit County, Washington, and we’ve joined with other farm and smart growth organizations in opposition to the projects. We are also preparing economic and jobs arguments for preserving farmland in anticipation of the next "land rush" as we slowly come out of the recession.
We are a month into our study of the Puget Sound Foodshed with the assistance of a dozen University of Washington graduate students and a top-flight advisory committee. The study is looking at food production and consumption in the 17 counties west of the Cascade Range using models such as our Think Globally, Eat Locally: San Francisco Foodshed Assessment. The study will 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.
 The Pacific Northwest office is also in the midst of an analysis of the most endangered farm and ranch landscapes of Washington, Oregon, Idaho and western Montana. Using land use data, a media scan, interviews, and other research, we are evaluating farm and ranch landscapes throughout the region to determine which areas are most at risk from urban sprawl, rural estates, competition for water, and water and soil pollution. Initial results of county-level analysis in Washington shows there are areas in need of improvement as farmland continues to disappear. We will reach out to local groups in the second phase of the analysis to confirm the issues and offer support in addressing the threats.
A foodshed
study of the Puget Sound region is underway to research what is produced and eaten
within 100 miles of Seattle.
The study will also look at how food travels from the farmer to the consumer
and how to reconnect the two to produce more food locally. Our goal is to make
a stronger case for the need for local farmland and to identify opportunities for
increased local production of food. Look for early results in December and the
completed study by March.
Montana-hayfield.jpgWe're identifying the farm landscapes of the Pacific Northwest that are most affected by urban sprawl, second home development, water pollution and other threats. Our hope is to develop alliances with local groups to address the issues and protect farms and farmers in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and western Montana.
salmon-in-river.jpgThanks to a recent grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, we'll soon offer grants through the Pioneers in Conservation program to support conservation projects on farmland in Washington. The program awards small grants to farmers to leverage other sources of conservation incentives and targets conservation efforts to high-priority rivers and wetlands. Look for announcements later this year.
 Twenty leaders from Northwest nonprofits met on the Hood Canal at a workshop we sponsored on environmental markets in mid-June. The workshop was very successful at building a common strategy for coordinating work on market development. Moving forward, small groups will continue to meet on market opportunities in the 2012 Farm Bill; transferable tools for credit valuation; and engagement of Washington regulators in market approval. As we continue to work on farmer-friendly approaches to environmental markets, this collaboration will help us move markets forward in the Northwest.
We are completing work on a strategic plan for the Skagit Farmland Legacy program, which purchases development rights on farmland in the Skagit Valley. The new plan fine-tunes procedures for soliciting, reviewing, and ranking proposals from area farmers and identifies potential funding sources for increasing the scale of the program. The revised plan will be presented to the Skagit County Commissioners on June 22.
Along with the Willamette Partnership, we will co-host a workshop for nonprofit leaders involved in conservation market development in the Northwest on June 15 and 16 in Union, Washington. The focus will be to develop a common strategy to overcome challenges and accelerate the development of conservation markets in the region.
 Governor Gregoire has invited nominations for outstanding work by local governments and their partners on community planning and development. The values and priorities of each community are apparent from their individual plans for how they want to look and function 20 or 50 years from now. For one community it may be an emphasis on supporting agriculture, another on prioritizing their downtown redevelopment—but it all adds up to shared vision, tough decisions and partnerships. Though we often hear about the controversies and debates, neighbors, farmers, business people and public officials are not only planning, but putting their plans into reality to make communities vibrant and livable.
The awards have been an annual event since 2006. Nominations are being sought in the following categories: Smart Vision Award for Comprehensive Planning, Smart Choices Award for Implementation of a Comprehensive Plan, and Smart Partnerships Award for Development Project to Implement a Comprehensive Plan.
Nominations are being accepted through May 4, 2011.
 At a March 17 meeting with the county's farmland protection leaders, we presented two different strategies for their property-tax-funded purchase of development rights program. The first would concentrate purchases on the edge of the existing towns and the Interstate 5 corridor in order to halt sprawl into farm areas. The second focused funds on large blocks of contiguous farmland away from developed areas. The decision was made to try to craft a hybrid of the two. The Skagit County program is the most active in the state and has protected more than 7,000 acres of farmland to date.
 We are following up on the publication of the Guide to Environmental Markets for Farmers and Ranchers with several projects to open markets to agriculture. Recently, we joined a group of community organizations led by Climate Solutions to consider ways to move forward with cost-effective, farmer-supported carbon sequestration projects despite the national stalemate on climate policy. Now we are beginning work on a first-of-its-kind cooperative to organize farmers to participate in emerging environmental markets. We will soon be hosting a meeting of environmental market leaders from across the Northwest to discuss how to cooperate on establishing farmer-friendly markets in the region. And speaking of the Guide, we have a pretty good supply of them in our office. Call us (206) 860-4222 if we can send you some copies. At the moment, we can handle orders up to a box (75 copies).
 We are working with the Skagit County Farmland Legacy Program to prepare a strategic plan for their purchase of conservation easement program. The Skagit program is a Northwest leader, providing $1 million per year to protect farmland with conservation easements. We are using a GIS analysis to evaluate several strategic options, including reinforcing the urban/rural boundary in the developing Interstate-5 corridor and protecting a core of highly productive farmland in the central valley. The Skagit Valley is the most intact and productive farm landscape in western Washington; protecting this land is of great significance to the region.
The Washington State Office of Farmland Preservation recently published two helpful new products of its work and of the work of the Washington Farmland Preservation Task Force. The first is their 2009 Report to the Washington State Conservation Commission, which nicely lays out the state’s challenges in protecting agriculture and the resources available to address them. The other excellent publication is a new "Washington State Farmland Preservation Indicators" booklet, which provides an excellent, up-to-date list of measures that indicate how well we are doing in preserving agriculture.
 American Farmland Trust is helping create markets for ecosystem services provided by agriculture. Farmland can provide environmental services such as carbon sequestration and wildlife habitat; however, farmers are not always compensated for the benefits their conservation efforts provide. This project seeks to create markets for these services so farmers and ranchers can supplement their farm incomes while providing much needed services to the rest of society at a reasonable cost. We have worked with the agriculture community to create the “Guide to Environmental Markets for Farmers and Ranchers,” as well as a series of workshops, presentations, and best practices for agriculture.
Read: How Conservation Markets Can Transform Agriculture and Protect the Environment [PDF]
Project Update
After a year of work, several Washington Counties are one step closer to developing plans for the encouragement of local farms and ranches and the preservation of agricultural lands. Last January, our State’s new Office of Farmland Preservation announced eight grants to counties to help them begin creating farmland preservation programs. Klickitat County, among others, received $25,000 for various projects. Now, the Office of Farmland Preservation is assembling the product of these efforts and is expected to make them public over the coming months – including our new report for the county, Keeping Farmland Available for Klickitat County Agriculture.
“No Farms No Food” is a message understood by nearly everyone, but farms provide more than just the food that sustains us. They also safeguard our natural resources. A recent feasibility study [PDF] by American Farmland Trust found that Washington farm and forest lands provide carbon sequestration, protect water quality and safeguard other environmental resources. The study suggests that ecosystem markets for agriculture could become a Washington reality in the next few years. These markets would encourage farmers to adopt the best conservation practices—and reward them financially for their stewardship. Given the positive results, Washington legislation charged the Washington State Conservation Commission to develop two conservation market pilot projects by December 2009.
Focus on Washington
On the outskirts of Wenatchee, a city in he heart of central Washington where golden hills surround endless miles of fruit orchards, a large apple-shaped sign reads, "Apple Capital of the World." In a region that ships over 100 million boxes of apples a year around the nation and the world, education has been the key to helping growers—especially the valley’s many Latino orchard employees and managers—reduce their use of pesticides. Grower Jesus Limón, who worked his way up the ranks at a fruit company in order to purchase his own Wenatchee Valley orchard, participated in an American Farmland Trust-supported and EPA-funded program that teaches growers in Spanish about integrated pest management. "You get hooked on it," Limon says about the natural techniques for identifying and eliminating orchard pests.
Our blog, The Farmland Report, ran a feature on Washington farmer Jay Gordon. Gordon uses his farmland as a protected habitat for endangered trumpeter swans. Gordon has also been profiled in our Farm and Food Voices section for his groundbreaking work for ecosystem markets in the region.
Contact Us
Pacific Northwest Office
Dennis Canty, Pacific Northwest States Director
1335 N. Northlake Way, Ste. 101
Seattle, WA
98103
(206) 860-4222
dcanty@farmland.org
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Uncovering the Network of Farms and Food in the Puget Sound
What Are the Most Endangered Farm Landscapes in the Pacific Northwest?
Pioneers in Conservation Program
Upcoming Workshops on Conservation Markets 
Ecosystem Markets for Farms Could Flourish in Washington
